Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who travels to Washington next week to meet with President Bush, escaped conviction Friday after a court invoked a statute of limitations that meant time had run out to sentence him for bribery.
Berlusconi welcomed the verdict, which brought down the curtain on a trial that lasted almost five years, saying he had always expected to be cleared.
“I was right to have been completely at peace about this because I was fully aware that I didn’t do anything wrong,” Berlusconi, a billionaire media and sports mogul, said in a statement in Rome.
The verdict, read to a packed court in Italy’s financial capital, implied that Berlusconi, 68, was guilty of one count of authorizing a $434,404 bribe to a Rome judge in 1991 but could not be sentenced because of the time limit.
The court then acquitted Berlusconi of a second charge of bribing the judiciary in the late 1980s to ensure victory in a contested takeover battle for a state-owned food group.
Doubt dogs Berlusconi’s integrity
Although Berlusconi emerges from the case with a clean criminal record, critics said the verdict still left a shadow over his reputation because the court had deployed a mechanism that prevented sentencing.
“Once more, people are playing with words in order to defraud public opinion. The statute of limitations is not a declaration of innocence, but it presumes guilt,” said opposition politician Antonio di Pietro, a former anti-corruption magistrate.
“It is important to remember that only the length of time that has passed prohibited the judges from ruling on the merits of the case,” he said.
Berlusconi, the first serving Italian prime minister to face a criminal trial, had always maintained his innocence and said he was the victim of a witch hunt by left-wing magistrates, who turned on him when he entered politics in 1994.
State prosecutors said he had authorized massive bribes to boost his business and had demanded an eight-year prison term.
But under Italian law, a court can accept “mitigating circumstances” for a defendant with a clean criminal record and halve the usual 15-year statute of limitations. As the charge dated to 1991, Berlusconi was thus automatically saved from a potentially devastating verdict.
Berlusconi’s lawyer, Gaetano Pecorella, told reporters that the prime minister would nonetheless appeal the ruling and seek a full acquittal on both counts.
Call for resignation
Former President Francesco Cossiga said Berlusconi should quit until he had completely cleared his name.
“This was a half-baked sentence ... and because Berlusconi is not just any ordinary citizen, he has the institutional duty toward the republic to resign,” Cossiga said.
While Berlusconi has faced several investigations and trials into corruption charges tied to his business dealings, the bribery charge was the most serious case brought against him.
It revolved around accusations that Fininvest paid off Rome judges to win a takeover battle for state-owned food firm SME.
In a second trial that ended last year, a court in Milan found one of Berlusconi’s former lawyers, Cesare Previti, guilty of bribing Judge Renato Squillante, not over SME but to secure a favorable legal climate for Fininvest in Rome legal circles.
Previti was sentenced to five years in prison and Squillante to an eight-year term. Both men have appealed.
By pure coincidence, a court in Sicily is due to deliver its verdict on Saturday in a case involving one of Berlusconi’s closest business and political associates, Marcello Dell’Utri, who is accused of colluding with the Mafia.
Dell’Utri was the driving force in building up Berlusconi’s political party on Sicily.
U.S. ties are strong
Berlusconi is to meet with Bush next Wednesday in the Oval Office, followed by lunch, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Friday.
Berlusconi has forged close ties with the president, built mostly on his contribution of Italian troops to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq despite wide public opposition at home to the war.
“The president and the prime minister share a strong commitment to the value of freedom, and Italy is making vital contributions to democracy and stability in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Balkans and elsewhere,” McClellan said. “President Bush and Prime Minister Berlusconi will use this opportunity to discuss how the United States and Europe can work more closely together on the many common challenges we face.”
