Minetti pardon to be confirmed after prosecutors' OK says Quirinale

The presidential pardon of Silvio

Berlusconi's former dental hygienist and ex People of Freedom

(PdL) Lombardy regional councillor Nicole Minetti from bunga

bunga pimping and other convictions so she can look after a

gravely ill Uruguayan boy she adopted is to be confirmed after

Milan prosecutors reviewed her case and found press allegations

against her unfounded, the office of President Sergio Mattarella

at Rome's Quirinale Palace said Thursday.

Minetti had a two year, 10 month sentence for pimping for the

sex parties at Berlusconi's home and a 13-month term for

embezzlement as part of a reimbursement scandal that hit the

Lombardy regional government pardoned in February.

The Milan investigators, who had given their blessing to the

pardon on humanitarian grounds after Minetti said she had to

care for the gravely ill child she adopted in Uruguay, had a

second look at the case and involved Interpol after Mattarella

wrote to the justice ministry asking for clarification following

press reports the plea was based on false declarations and that

the former bunga bunga party organiser had continued to run sex

parties in the villa of her boyfriend, businessman Giuseppe

Cipriani, in Uruguay, that there were irregularities in the

adoption procedure, and that the nine-year-old boy was no longer

ill.

In a statement Wednesday, Milan Chief Prosecutor Francesca Nanni

said the press reports that gave rise to the supplementary

investigation were "not true".

She said there was no evidence to support the assertions made to

Il Fatto Quotidiano newspaper by a Uruguayan masseuse who worked

at Cipriani's villa, alleging that Minetti had organised sex and

drug laced parties at the ranch at Punta Del Este.

Nanni also said there was proof the boy still needed constant

treatment.

Minetti said she would now seek damages from Il Fatto Quotidiano

daily, Berlusconi channel talk show E' Sempre Cartabianca and

Rai investigative reporting programme Report for reporting she

was still running sex parties.

The Quirinale said in a statement Thursday:

"The President of the Republic, who had publicly requested the

Ministry of Justice—which he thanks for its prompt response—to

order new investigations, has respectfully acknowledged the

conclusions of the Milan Prosecutor General's Office, according

to which there are no grounds for a reassessment of the clemency

measure adopted, reaffirming his confidence in the judiciary."

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