Negotiation, everything that Berlusconi did not want to explain in court: from the laws advanced to Mangano to the pressure of Dell'Utri to the government

He sat in the same place as Tommaso Buscetta: from that chair the boss of the two worlds revealed to the world the secrets of the mafia. Silvio Berlusconihowever, he was not a repented but only a witness witnessed. As such it had two options: make use of the right not to answer; or to clarify at least a part of the accusations and gods suspects which for years has cast a shadow over his career as an entrepreneur and politician. On the other hand, the status of suspect of connected crime the former prime minister cashed it thanks to the fact that the prosecutor of Florence investigates him for heinous crimes like the Milan massacres, Rome is Florence of 1993, and the failed attacks a Maurizio Costanzo it's at Totuccio Contorno. Very serious accusations: wasn't it worth taking the opportunity of the trip to Palermo to clarify everything? Also because in the first degree sentence of the Negotiation the former premier is depicted as one victim of the stragista threat addressed by Cosa Nostra to the State. If in Palermo he had chosen option number two he would have only to say the truth, while accusing and defending they could not have asked questions on matters far from the facts of the trial. Even when the witnessed heads he decides to answer, in fact, he is always guaranteed the possibility of remaining silent to prevent him from making statements self-accusatory.

Silence with 12 words – Guarantees that were not enough for Berlusconi. Which eventually chose option number one, the way of silence, formalized with twelve words: "On the advice of my lawyers, I avail myself of the right to remain silent". No space at jokes nor to the images given that as a television man he carefully avoided being immortalized in the prison bunker classroom Ucciardone of Palermo, the green spaceship built for the Maxi Trial. The only thing missing from the bars was the phantom of Vittorio Mangano, stableman ad Arcore and mafia boss a New door, also among the defendants of the historic proceeding organized by Giovanni Falcone is Paolo Borsellino. It will have been for the evocative power of the places that the former prime minister opted for a quick blitz in the Sicilian capital: having arrived at the airport a few minutes before the deposition, he left immediately afterwards.

Escape from the questions – In the middle, in fact, he spoke the twelve words he used to explain to judge Angelo Pellino the intention to avail himself of the faculty of not answering. The same faculty that Berlusconi had already exercised in 2002: at that time the judges who were trying Marcello Dell’Utri for external competition a Cosa Nostra they went to Palazzo Chigi to question the historic employer of their accused. Even then, the then prime minister decided not to say anything. Dell'Utri would then be sentenced to seven years, a sentence that will end in a few weeks. And it is precisely to avoid ending up in jail again that the creator of Forza Italia cited his friend Silvio. An occasion that the man of Arcore could have exploited to his advantage and explain a series of circumstances, while at the same time giving a help to a life partner.

Have you ever had mafia pressures through Dell'Utri? – That was not the case. The question that in all probability Francesco Centonze, Dell'Utri's lawyer, wanted to give the illustrious witness an unanswered answer: president, in 1994 did your government ever receive mafia threats through Dell'Utri? On the other hand, it was the same order in which last July the court had given the green light to his hearing to recite the object of Berlusconi's Sicilian trip: "To report what he knows about the mafia threats suffered by the government he presided over in 1994 while he was premier ". In fact, Dell’Utri was convicted because drive belt intimidation from Mafia bosses and addressed to Palazzo Chigi. As Berlusconi thinks about it, he already said it on April 20, 2018, the day of the first degree sentence: "We did not receive in 1994nor subsequently, no threat from the Mafia or its representatives ". It is for this reason that Dell'Utri's lawyer wanted to show the video with that statement by Berlusconi in the courtroom, to make up for the silence of the excellent witness.

Only the whole truth – However, if he had accepted to answer the questions of the defense of his historic right-hand man, the leader of Forza Italia he should have done so even with the accusation. And he should have told the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth. On the bench of substitute attorneys general Giuseppe Fici is Sergio Barbiera there were some sheets with a series of questions to submit to the witness, in the latter case he had opted for option number two. Questions unrelated to the 1993 massacres, accusations that make Berlusconi a suspect of a connected crime and on which the former prime minister could not have responded in any case in order to avoid self-indulgence.

What did you know about the laws "welcome" to the mafiosi? – The leader of Forza Italiahowever, he would probably have been asked about some moments of his first executive. For example: because between presented at the end of 1994 and the first months of 1995 which had as its objective that of modifying the pre-trial detention for the mafiosi? For the accusation it is one of the counterparts asked by Cosa Nostra to the Berlusconi government thanks to the intercession of Dell’Utri. The same public prosecution wanted to go deeper into this passage when it asked to reopen the debate last summer. The history of that law is told in the reasons for the first degree sentence of the Negotiation. "There is full feedback on the fact that, just before Christmas 1994, that is December 20, 1994, the law was defined by the competent parliamentary Commission, containing some expected legislative changes and"like ' from the mafiosi, who were expected to approve and, therefore, transform into law, already in the following month of January 1995 ″, wrote the assize court. What does Berlusconi remember of that text of the law, not approved only because of the premature fall of his first executive? And that rule was somehow linked to the decree blonde, the so-called "salvaladri"- then unconverted and decayed – which in addition to opening the cages to the bribe-takers contained within it a rule to require prosecutors to disclose to the lawyers the names of the suspected mobsters?

Was he just a stable boy? – About the threat "transmitted" by Dell'Utri a Palazzo Chigi, if Berlusconi replied he could have been asked about something else. Starting with the relationship between his historic right-hand man and Mangano, the mafia boss assumed as stable boy a Villa San Martino in 1974. "The presence of Vittorio Mangano in Arcore, mafioso of the district of Porta Nuova, for the through of Dell’Utri, represents the convergence of interests between Berlusconi and Cosa Nostra", Was already written in the final sentence condemning the former senator to seven years for external competition. "We were looking for a groom to look after the horses, in Lombardy we didn't find any", has always been the version of the former president of the council, when he did not go beyond defining the boss of Porta Nuova as "hero".

Read pro mafia in preview at the mafia? – Stables or non-stable boy, certainly even twenty years after being hired at Villa San Martino, Mangano continued to hear Dell'Utri: according to the judges of the trial of first instance the founder of Forza Italia (who in 1994 did not apply directly to the policies) anticipated to Mangano the content of read "like" to the bosses that the government was preparing. "We intend to refer – it is written in the sentence – to the fact that on that occasion of June – July 1994 Dell'Utri had to report to Mangano"preview' of an imminent legislative change regarding arrests for mafia suspects without fuss, or better said hidden so much that even later it was not detected, inserted in the folds of the text of a decree law which remained almost unknown, in its definitive text, even to the Ministers until the eve, if not in some cases on the same day, of its approval by the Council of Ministers of the Government chaired by Berlusconi ”.

Who made those laws in favor of the bosses? – In practice, according to the judges, Mangano was aware of the government's legislative activity Berlusconi well before the same ministers were informed. And he knew about it even though it was an activity "never advertised and also for his technicalities, not obtainable from reading newspapers ”. Was it true? IS Berlusconi knew it? O Dell’Utri was acting independently, despite not being part of the government and at that time even of the Parliament? Or was it an obscure "hand" to put those rules on the Council of Ministers' table just before telling Mangano about its contents? Berlusconi, unfortunately, chose not to respond. And therefore at the moment only the written words of the Assize Court remain: "The fact that Dell'Utri was informed of this legislative amendment, much to report to Mangano to prove compliance with the commitment made with the mafia, further demonstrates that he himself he continued to inform Berlusconi of all his contacts with the mafia the same even after the establishment of the Government by the latter presided over, because only Berlusconi, as prime minister, could have authorized a legislative intervention such as the one that was attempted with the approval of the decree law of July 14th 1994 n. 440 and, therefore, to report to Dell'Utri for ‘calm"His interlocutors, as the Dell'Utri actually did".

Money to Cosa Nostra: Did He Know Nothing? – On the reports Berlusconi-Dell'Utri-Cosa Nostra a lot has been investigated and written. Just to stay on the issues at the center of the process, the former prime minister has missed the opportunity to clarify if it is true what the court of Assise believes proved in the first degree verdict: it is true that the friend Has Marcello paid the mafiosi for Arcore for years? "It is indisputably demonstrated by the aforementioned disbursement, by the companies headed by the same Berlusconi, of large sums of money, then, actually paid to Cosa Nostra. In fact, Dell'Utri, without the endorsement and authorization of Berlusconi, could not, of course, dispose of such large sums delivered to the mafia ", he wrote in the 5,252 pages of the reasons for the sentence. That the former senator was the "decisive" guarantor of the agreement between the former prime minister and Cosa Nostra had already been definitively established by the Cassation in the Dell'Utri judgment. The first degree of the Negotiation, however, goes further: "It is decisive to note that these payments continued until at least December 1994 because this shows irrefutably that still up until the aforementioned date Dell'Utri, which acted as intermediary, reported to Berlusconi about relations with the mafia, keeping the necessary sums of money and the authorization to pay and to Cosa Nostra ". Berlusconi would have continued to pay the bosses even after the election at Palazzo Chigi: is it really so? The leader of Forza Italia is the first president of the board of direct financier of the octopus? The former prime minister has preferred not to respond. Once again, the questions will remain so.

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