Minister's husband jailed for Berlusconi 'bribe'
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Independent Minds
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British lawyer David Mills, left, and Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi are seen in this composite image
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David Mills, the estranged husband of Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell, was today sentenced to four and a half years in jail for taking a bribe from Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to give false evidence in corruption trials.
Mills, 64, was convicted by a court in Milan at the end of a three-year trial on charges of accepting a 600,000 dollar (then £350,000) payment from the politician and media tycoon.
In a statement released after the verdict, Mills protested his innocence and said he was hopeful he would be cleared on appeal.
He said: "I am naturally very disappointed by this verdict.
"I am innocent, but this is a highly political case.
"The judges have not yet given their reasons for their decision, so I cannot say how they dealt with the prosecutor's own admission that he had no proof.
"I am hopeful that the verdict and sentence will be set aside on appeal and am told that I will have excellent grounds, and have every faith in my excellent lawyer, Federico Cecconi.
"The sentence does not become effective for any purpose until two levels of appeal have been concluded.
"I have been advised not to make any further public comment on the case until it has finally come to an end.
"Meanwhile, I am getting on with my professional life."
Mills is not thought to have been in Italy for the verdict.
The sentence is close to the four years, eight months which prosecutors had been asking for if Mills was convicted.
It is regarded as unlikely that he will go to prison because, by the time the appeals process is finished, the time allowed for a sentence will have expired under Italy's statute of limitations.
Mr Berlusconi was originally accused of corruption - but his case was frozen last year after his government passed a law giving legal immunity to top officials, including the premier.
Mills, a tax lawyer, was accused of taking a bribe to give false testimony in a trial Mr Berlusconi faced in relation to his business dealings. Mills was one of Mr Berlusconi's consultants on offshore tax havens.
The charges stemmed from a letter which Mills sent to a British accountant in 2004 in which he said the 600,000 dollar payment came from "Mr B".
He wrote: "I turned some very tricky corners, to put it mildly, and so kept Mr B out of a great deal of trouble that I would have landed him in had I said all I knew."
Mills said the letter described a hypothetical situation as a way of soliciting tax advice for an unnamed client.
He said the money came from an Italian shipbuilder, Diego Attanasio, who had once been his client, a claim repeated by Mr Berlusconi, but which Mr Attanasio denies.
Both Mills and Mr Berlusconi have denied any wrongdoing.
Ms Jowell said: "This is a terrible blow to David and, although we are separated, I have never doubted his innocence."
Mills was also ordered to pay damages of 250,000 euro, according to Italian news agency Ansa.
In January, the solicitor representing the Italian government, which is bringing a civil suit against Mills for damaging the reputation of the Italian premier's office, asked judges for Mills to pay damages of that amount, and the court ordered Mills to pay the sum, Ansa reported.
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Comments
This law recognises that one person is corrupted by another and both are implicated.
So watch this space! Italian centrist "clean hands" politician (the ex-magistrate who started this whole process, years ago and then became an MP, Antonio DI Pietro, said just a few minutes ago "In any normal country, the Prime Minster would already have resigned. If Mills has been condemned for being 'corrupt' that means there must also have been a 'corrupter' ".
And even funnier that this story was believed by the Judge.
The difference is MR B can re wite his national laws to get himslf off the hook. Happily Boombusted brown our iwn Mr B cannot do that
yet??
the other B wld have tried as he did withthe so called legal opinion on the "war on terror in iraq"
Althoug all highly corrupt , it ' s still disappointing
Hopefully life has just become a lot lot more troublesome for one of Bliar's stalwart court of corruption, he was nailed this time, it would be good to see that witch of a wife of his nailed for her part in the attempted breakup and theft of the BBC which her, Mills, Blair and Berlusconi were all involved in and even Murdoch was up for this, that seeing his main rival broken up and Mill's and Wife taking a big cut, with Berlusconi being in the frame for buying key elements of the BBC.
And yes it is organised economic crime, in fact its not just economic as the UN released recently data that showed that a lot of the banks being held afloat have been done so through mafia and other monies from organised felonious crime...
Notice how they are beginning to get flushed out though, Madoff, Mills, now that Sir something or other in Texas, the Pentagon finally chasing the missing embezzled trillions with a paper trail all the way up to Bremer and beyond, oh I think we are going to see some rather good public crucifixions in the next year as the people catch up with these vermin...
"I turned some very tricky corners, to put it mildly, and so kept Mr B out of a great deal of trouble that I would have landed him in had I said all I knew." Mills said the letter described a hypothetical situation as a way of soliciting tax advice for an unnamed client.
Then why speak in the past tense? And how can Tessa Jowell claim he is innocent if she doesn't know anything about his business dealings or even who paid off the mortgage on their house?
In the UK it's all covered up. Don't think for one minute that the UK is less corrupt than Italy.
Both of them should face the appeal trials and, if found guilt again, they should go to prison like any other Italian citizen.
Mr Berlusconi did not resigned from his premiership because he fears prison, has no moral integrity and does not respect the law: after all he is "more equal than any other Italian citizen".
Wrighty55, in Italy not everyone is a Mr B supporter. You proposal would be great, as lon as would be allowed to seek for Political Asilum abroad for the Italians leaving this country.
My comment is sarchastic of course. This country, as many others around, are under the control of the worst politician class since ages.
my name is Cristiano, I am italian and I live and work in Bologna, Italy.
Thank you for your article about David Mills and premier Berlusconi.
Here there are articles about this topic but there isn't openness.. it is sufficient omit some word, hide the truth behind a main title, to tell to people another story, another tale..
When something isn't told, that thing doesn't exist.
Cristiano Novelli
Bologna, Italy
...A few years ago there was talk of ad personam laws. They did ad personam laws and the definition was technically perfect because the laws made in the 20012006 legislature by the second Berlusconi government were all designed to save the President of the Council and his accomplices from trials.
In this legislature, we have seen ad personam laws like the Lodo Alfano and let s hope it will soon be swept away as it is unconstitutional filth but what they are preparing in Parliament now with a myriad of measures, that all seem unconnected and improvised, has nothing to do with the logic of the ad personam laws..
...These are ad sistemam laws, if you can say that. They are laws that are very organic that are not aimed at saving Mr X or Mr Y from trials but they are aimed at saving the whole establishment, the whole Caste...let s say the whole cosca (gang), lt s use its real name because by now it is answering to laws that are no longer the ones that are imposed on us,thus it is a gigantic political and economic Cosca,with the financial guys at the driving wheel and the politicians in tow.
Without observing that the heavyweight delinquents are happier to collaborate more willingly with the magistrates that they trust: Buscetta wanted to talk to Falcone and no one else; Mutolo wanted to talk to Borsellino and no one else; the kick back folk in Milan queued up outside the door of Di Pietro and no one else s. Those were magistrates that could be recognised, well known for their ability, even infamous if you like, and thus the criminal who is a man of power feels that they can trust in someone who on the other side represents the good power, who has broad shoulders will be difficult to budge, and thus is a person that you can count on and use as a point of reference...Censorship for Magistrates and for journalism...Another regulation: what is a possibility for a magistrate to defend himself? The possibility of speaking out, to talk about, not the investigation that he is carrying out, but to denounce what they are doing to him....now there s an infinite series of limitations to the possibilities of magistrates speaking out if the magistrates speak without talking about their investigations, as has happened with Forleo and De Magistris and they find excuses and send them away anyway...If they talk about one of their investigations, without revealing anything secret but giving to the citizens, information that they need, the investigation is taken from them. This is a regulation that is in the law on wiretapping. Just think. They arrest the gang that set fire to that Indian immigrant near Rome, they arrest the rapists, the assumed rapists or those who have confessed to rape like those of the other day: usually the magistrate and the Police Forces hold a press conference in which they provide information to the newspapers and the citizens. Don t worry, we have captured them, these are the items of evidence, they have confessed, we have found the weapon used in the offence.No, he will no longer be able to do that: if the magistrates says one word even to give two or three items of information to the general public he immediately loses the investigation, and it lands up with someone else who has to start from the beginning.If then the defendant raises an objection about this in relation to his prosecutor not at the beginning but during the trial, then obviously the prosecutor has to go away and someone else has to step in,someone else who has not followed that investigation and who thus has to start from the beginning.Thus the magistrates will be afraid of even saying their own name.They will recite their identification number only, like the military prisoners do in certain films.Finally, we have the law...that is within the regulations that prohibit journalists from talking about current investigations.If this law gets passed, we will no longer be able to tell you that they have arrested the rapists in that case or in that other case...We will no longer be able to tell you that persons A, B or C have been captured, investigated, searched or had goods sequestrated.
You can see Italy is enourmously in trouble..
The day before yesterday, Silvio Berlusconi gave an interview to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo in which he stated that Judge Gandus who pronounced Mills to be guilty of having been corrupted by Berlusconi, is a left wing campaigner and thus there are doubts about her impartiality but, he adds: - I am absolutely certain that I will be absolved when the trial restarts.- And anyway if and when that trial should restart it will not be Judge Gandus presiding because as soon as she has written the grounds for the decision in the Mills case which will have to deal with the role of the defendant for having corrupted Mills, that is the defendant Berlusconi, she will become incompatible. Then he added: -unfortunately a part of the Italian magistracy is politicised and it has used and still uses its power as a weapon in the political battle against its adversaries, in particular against the only person in the Centre Right who can have the upper hand with the Left. The politicised judges have tried to overturn the democratic result and they succeeded in 1994, with the accusation from which I was naturally completely absolved, after 10 years of trials.- It was the famous story of the corruption of the Finance Police. Then he gives the usual imaginary facts about the trials he has been through and says: -Conclusion: I have always ended up innocent because, fortunately, the impartial judges are in the majority.-
Naturally, since we are dealing with one of the greatest fibbers in the world there is no need to underline how many fibs there are in these affirmations, however one fact is interesting: we have often talked about the results already brought about by the campaign of recent years against the magistrates that are dealing with the powerful people to apply the law in an equal manner for everyone, for them as well as the poor souls. They have been exterminated. Di Pietro was obliged to leave the magistracy with the well known blackmail of the dossiers in the Brescia trials, Clementina Forleo has been thrown out of Milan after having dealt with Unipol, Luigi De Magistris has been thrown out Catanzaro after dealing with criminal political-judicial filth in the region of Calabria, the Salerno magistrates have been thrown out after having put their noses in those affairs; so basically, we have always used a slogan that we borrowed from Mao and the Red Brigades: strike one to educate one hundred, strike two, three, five, seven, ten, fifteen to educate all ten thousand of them.