Berlusconi acquitted of trying to buy the silence of witnesses to his sex parties

Silvio Berlusconi, in the midst of all the political controversies this week, breathed a sigh of relief this morning.

After six years of hearings, new data and indications of all kinds about the possibility that he could have bribed the participants of his sex parties in 2010, a court in Milan acquitted him on Wednesday of those charges.

The case, known as Ruby Ter ―because it is the third part of the process in which the then Moroccan minor Karima El-Mahroug, known as

, was implicated― thus reaches the end of a long road and allows

of

86 years, from one of the biggest corruption scandals in which a prime minister in Italy had been involved.

Last May, the Milanese Prosecutor's Office demanded six years in prison and the seizure of 10.8 million euros.

The tycoon was accused of a crime of corruption for allegedly having paid for the silence of the participants in his parties.

Twenty-eight of those people were also accused of perjury and have also been acquitted.

After dozens of scandals, more than 40 open trials and first-degree convictions, the only firm conviction that Berlusconi has received in all these years was for tax fraud.

The facts refer to the sale of the rights to broadcast American films by his audiovisual group (Mediaset).

The company artificially increased the real price of the rights to evade money from the tax authorities and, incidentally,

send it to Berlusconi accounts abroad.

That conviction cost him what hurt him the most: disqualification for four years from holding any public office.

The parties of

, known as Bunga-Bunga - he himself explained that it was a joke that was made with his friend, the Libyan dictator Muammar el Gaddafi - led to the first two cases against Berlusconi.

The Milan Prosecutor's Office then decided to open this investigation as a "due act" following the indications of the judges who handled the

in first instance in its two ramifications, who sentenced the former prime minister on June 24 to seven years imprisonment. imprisonment and life disqualification from public office for abuse of power and incitement to prostitution of minors (he was later acquitted in the court of appeal).

The abuse of power for which he was convicted at the time referred to the events that followed the arrest, on the night of May 27 and 28, 2010, of the famous Ruby, the underage prostitute who had supposedly gone to his parties (she was also involved in another scandal involving players from the French soccer team).

That night she was accused of stealing about 3,000 euros from another prostitute with whom she shared a flat.

Upon learning of the affair, Berlusconi called from Paris and pressured the policemen at the central police station in Milan to release her.

According to the judges, the only and urgent interest of the then head of the Italian Government was to "protect himself" and that is why he assured the police that the girl was the niece of the then Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and that her arrest could trigger an incident. diplomatic.

Ruby was released – under the guardianship of another of the former president's always young and beautiful friends – but the story became the worst nightmare of Berlusconi's political life.

It was the first attempt to cover their backs.

The other branch of the process, which was separated from that of Berlusconi due to the stoppages suffered by the immunity laws by the then prime minister, sentenced three people to between five and seven years in prison for inducing prostitution and pimping. from Berlusconi's entourage;

Lele Mora, Emilio Fede and Nicole Minetti.

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