(fixes slug).
Justice Minister Andrea Orlando
said Thursday he had ordered "preliminary checks" into a
controversial wiretap involving Sicilian Governor Rosario
Crocetta, the existence of which is disputed.
"I have launched the preliminary checks as is the case
every time there is an improper circulation of trial
information," Orlando said.
"There is no specificity, it is almost an automatism," the
minister added.
Crocetta suspended himself last Thursday after L'Espresso
magazine published the tap in which he allegedly said nothing
when his doctor Matteo Turino, probed in a hospital graft case,
said Sicily health councillor Lucia Borsellino should meet the
same fate as her Cosa-Nostra slain father, anti-Mafia prosecutor
Paolo Borsellino.
Prosecutor's offices subsequently said they had no such
wiretap on their files but the magazine stood by its story,
saying the tap had been classified.
Crocetta, a member of Premier Matteo Renzi's Democratic
Party (PD), claimed he was the victim of a smear campaign and
announced he would sue l'Espresso for 10 million euros.
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