ITALIAN PRIME minister Silvio Berlusconi yesterday had to deal with yet another series of revelations about his allegedly inappropriate after hours behaviour.
Mr Berlusconi has been in the media hotseat in recent days because of homophobic remarks and because of allegations of improper relations with a 17-year-old Moroccan girl.
Now Nadia Macri (27) has told investigators that, like the Moroccan “Ruby”, she too attended late night sex parties this year at the 74-year-old prime minister’s private residences in Sardinia and Milan. Moreover, she claims Mr Berlusconi personally paid her €10,000 for two sexual encounters.
She claims that she came in contact with the prime minister’s entourage via TV impresario Lele Mora and TV news director Emilio Fede, both men close to the prime minister and accused of having introduced “Ruby” to him. She alleges that more than 25 young women and various public figures attended one of these parties in Mr Berlusconi’s Villa Certoso residence in Sardinia.
At a certain point in the evening, the majority of the guests departed, leaving Mr Berlusconi alone with the girls: “He would say, ‘let’s have the next one’ . . . we were all in the swimming pool where we had sex”, Ms Macri reportedly told investigators.
She also said that there was always marijuana to smoke in the prime minister’s residence, marijuana that had been transported on the premier’s private jet.
Investigators in Palermo had come across Ms Macri in the context of a drug investigation which led to the arrest in July of Perla Genovesi (32), a former personal assistant to a senator from Mr Berlusconi’s Freedom Party, accused of cocaine trafficking. In the course of interrogation, Ms Genovesi told investigators that a friend of hers, Nadia Macri, had had sexual encounters with important politicians, including Mr Berlusconi, minister for public administration Renato Brunetta and mayor of Parma Pietro Vignali.
Mr Brunetta and Mr Vignali admit they met Ms Macri, but deny any inappropriate behaviour. Mr Berlusconi’s lawyer, Nicolo Ghedini, said the allegations would be contradicted by the evidence of people who have attended Mr Berlusconi’s parties.