Italian police on Friday seized
assets worth some 29 million euros from suspects in a probe into
alleged corruption at Genoa's Carige bank, including former
chairman Giovanni Berneschi.
Property and valuables were confiscated and bank accounts
frozen.
Berneschi and his daughter-in-law Francesca Amisano are
among the suspects.
In June police seized five million euros from accounts
in the names of Berneschi, Amisano and the former chief
executive officer of the Carige Vita Nuova subsidiary, Fernando
Menconi.
Berneschi, who was Carige's president until last year, was
arrested in May along with Menconi and real-estate businessman
Ernesto Cavallini.
Police said they believe Berneschi, 77, was the ringleader
of a scam involving purchases made at inflated prices of stakes
in companies headed by accomplices, which allegedly made it
possible for 21 million euros to be taken out of Italy into
Switzerland between 2006 and 2009.
They suspect that part of this money was used to buy
properties in Switzerland in the name of senior figures at
Carige, a Genoa-based lender with about 1,000 branches and two
million clients.
Previous investigations led prosecutors to believe Carige
manages used the trust centre to avoid monitoring of the Bank of
Italy over illegal operations.
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