After 3 and a half years of investigation. The investigating judge: “Objective not achieved to finance an illegal party”
The investigation into the Metropol case has been closed. The investigating judge of Milan Stefania Donadeo filed the position of Gianluca Savoini, founder of the Lombardy-Russia association, the business lawyer Gianluca Meranda and the former banker Francesco Vannucci under investigation for international corruption for the alleged Russian affair that took place at the hotel metropol.
“The investigation into alleged Russian funds in the Metropol case has been closed. Now we await the apologies of many, and we prepare lawsuits for many”. Matteo Salvini, leader of the League, writes it on social media.
After 3 and a half years of investigations, the investigation has thus closed, with the business meeting in Moscow at the center, in which six people took part, and which according to the initial hypothesis of the prosecutor would have seen the protagonist in an operation suspected of corruption linked to the importation into Italy of a large quantity of oil which, in the words of those who are allegedly negotiating, should bring 65 million dollars into the League’s coffers in one year and thus allow the party led by Matteo Salvini to face the electoral campaign of the last European. Hypothesis definitively archived.
In closing the case, the investigating judge Donadeo indulges in some reflections on the possibility of challenging the three suspects with the hypothesis of illegal financing, albeit in an attempted form. “It must be highlighted that the investigations showed that the acts put in place were unequivocally directed towards the final objective of illegally financing the Lega party, thanks to the relationships that Savoini, president of the Lombardy-Russia cultural association, had been able to weave with influential personalities from the Russian political, economic and cultural world” reads the 18 pages of reasons for archiving. According to the initial hypothesis of the Milan prosecutor’s office, the suspected corruption operation was linked to the importation into Italy of a large quantity of oil which in one year would have brought 65 million dollars into the coffers of the League, thus allowing the party led by Matteo Salvini to face the 2019 European election campaign.
“However, these deeds – reads the provision of the Milan investigating judge – cannot qualify as suitable for achieving, at least potentially, the purpose, not only as the final phase of destination of a certain percentage to the League has not been completed, but not even the main transaction of sale Ultimately, not even the first stages of the negotiation were completed (the purchase of petroleum products from a Russian company by Euro IB and the resale to Ets, or to another different entity, at a higher price), the entire operation is part of a criminal purpose that does not constitute a crime”.
“We learned with great satisfaction that the investigating judge of Milan accepted the request for dismissal made by the prosecutors with reference to the so-called Metropol case, which had created such a stir and conspiracy theorists in the summer of 2019. The defense of Gianluca Meranda and Francesco Vannucci did not has never cultivated doubts regarding the non-involvement of its clients in relation to the alleged crime, as well as, in the silence that the seriousness that the penal system requires in respect of the work of the judiciary, has always trusted in justice. to a story with exquisitely journalistic traits and certainly devoid of legal relevance”. This was stated by the lawyer Ersi Bozheku, defender of two of the suspects for whom the investigating judge of Milan has requested the archiving.
Source-www.adnkronos.com