Court says no proof Tarantini extorted money from Berlusconi

(ANSA) - Rome, April 29 - Judges in Rome on Tuesday said there was no proof that Bari businessman Giampaolo Tarantini extorted 500,000 euros from ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi to withhold information on escorts he provided the centre-right leader. The statement was part of a court's explanation behind dropping charges last October against Tarantini in the case, which refers back to the March-July period in 2011 when police suspected Berlusconi paid Tarantini in exchange for making false statements in a prostitution case in which Berlusconi is a defendant.
    According to prosecutors, Berlusconi asked Valter Lavitola, former editor of Avanti! newspaper, to pressure Tarantini into lying about the nature of a group of escorts that Tarantini brought to Berlusconi's home in the period between 2008 and 2009, when Berlusconi was a sitting premier.
    Tarantini had always claimed Berlusconi didn't know the 26 escorts he brought to the then-premier's house for so-called 'bunga bunga' sex parties were paid prostitutes.
    At the same time, Berlusconi always denied the money he paid Tarantini was a gift when he learned the Bari businessman was in financial trouble. In a separate case, Tarantini is among seven defendants currently on trial for allegedly supplying the billionaire media mogul with women for sex parties in exchange for public contracts.
    The three-time premier, who is appealing a six-year conviction for paying for sex with an underage prostitute in a separate case, says he has never hired prostitutes.
    Meanwhile he is expected to begin community service at a facility for the elderly outside his native Milan after the supreme Court of Cassation found him guilty of dodging 370 million euros in taxes at his media empire Mediaset. The four-year sentence, reduced to a year of community service due to an amnesty, was his first-ever binding conviction in 20 years of legal entanglements he blames on a "witch-hunt" by an allegedly left-wing judiciary. The conviction also led to his expulsion from the Senate and a lifetime ban from holding office.