Berlusconi faces bribery, sex hearings

18 Jul 2011, 7:58 pm   -   Source: AFP
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Italian PM Berlusconi, 74, is a defendant in three ongoing trials. (AAP)

Italian PM Berlusconi, 74, is a defendant in three ongoing trials. (AAP)

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi faces trial hearings for bribery and paying for sex with a 17-year-old girl on Monday, as the Italian leader fights off growing unpopularity and financial woes.

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A Milan court rejected submissions by Silvio Berlusconi's defence team on Monday in the trial against the Italian premier for alleged bribery and paying for sex with a 17-year-old girl.
  
Lawyers for the prime minister had presented 16 preliminary complaints in the trial -- which began on April 6 -- including a challenge to the court's right to hear the case.
  
"In light of the charges, the court considers itself to be competent," the ruling said.
  
Berlusconi is accused of paying for sex with Moroccan-born Karima El Mahroug, better known as "Ruby the Heart Stealer", when she was 17, at a series of wild "dinner" parties held at his private villa in the north of Italy.
  
The prime minister is also suspected of abusing his powers by having the girl sprung from police custody when she was arrested in May 2010 for alleged theft -- a move prosecutors say was an attempt to hide his sex crime.
  
The premier's lawyers argued that the prostitution charge for the television magnate should be heard by a court in Monza, closer to his luxurious personal residence in Arcore, outside Milan, where the alleged crime took place.
  
His defence also challenged the Milan court's authority to hold the trial at all, saying the abuse of power charge should be considered by a special ministers' court.
  
The Milan court ruled Monday that the trial should not be held in a special minister's court because Berlusconi was not acting within his role of prime minister when he called the police, but was simply abusing his political power.
  
It also rejected the defence's request to move the trial to Monza.
  
The 74-year old prime minister, who is a defendent in three ongoing trials and is fighting off growing unpopularity, was not in court to hear the ruling.
  
He faces up to 12 years in prison if convicted of abuse of power.  

PROTESTING INNOCENCE

Berlusconi has repeatedly protested his innocence of all the charges and insists prosecutors are waging a personal vendetta against him.

The billionaire tycoon has been under investigation ever since entering politics in the early 1990s.

Monday's hearing is expected to be important procedurally after Berlusconi's lawyers challenged the court's authority to hold the trial at all, saying the abuse of power charge should be considered by a special ministers' court.

Berlusconi's defence also contends that the prostitution charge for the television magnate should be heard by a court closer to his luxurious personal residence in Arcore, outside Milan, where the alleged crime took place.

In the other trial hearing, he is accused of bribing his former lawyer with $US600,000.

Several witnesses living in Switzerland are set to testify in that hearing on Monday via video conference.

Berlusconi is also a defendant in a third trial involving alleged tax fraud committed by his business empire, Mediaset, with distribution rights deals. He is also being investigated for fraud in a fourth case involving another of his companies, Mediatrade, which has not gone to trial yet.

Berlusconi is on the backfoot politically following his People of Freedom party's defeat in key local elections in May and a round of referendums last month in which several key policies for his government were struck down.

Despite reports of serious infighting with key coalition partner the Northern League - and with ministers inside his cabinet - Berlusconi still holds a majority in both the lower and upper houses of parliament.

He has vowed to see out his mandate, which runs until 2013. Italy's record-high public debt and near-zero growth are also beginning to weigh on Berlusconi's leadership, however.

There are growing signs of investor unease about Italy's ability to stay out of the eurozone debt crisis.

Silvio Berlusconi

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