A panel of judges on Monday sentenced former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to seven years in prison for abusing power and having sex with an underage prostitute, CNN reported. Judges also barred him from holding public office.
"What happened today is very serious," defense attorney Nicolo Ghedini said, having argued that judges had not appropriately considered court proceedings. Ghedini told reporters he was not surprised by the verdict because he was not given a fair trial.
"An incredible sentence has been issued of a violence never seen or heard of before, to try to eliminate me from the political life of this country," Berlusconi said.
"I intend to resist against this persecution because I am absolutely innocent and I don't want in any way to abandon my battle to make Italy a country that is truly free and just."
Prosecutors argued Berlusconi had sex 13 times with Karima el Mahroug, an underage prostitute of Moroccan descent. He also abused his position when he intervened in May 2010 to get her released from jail where she washad been hel on charges of theft. In a 389-page document presented to a court in 2011, prosecutors alleged Berlusconi paid el Mahroug and scores of other young women for taking part in "bunga bunga parties" at his private residence in Milan. Tawdry tales emanating from those parties have emerged, with young women reportedly performed stripteases and erotic action in exchange for money and gifts.
"It is absurd to suggest I have paid for a rapport with a woman. It is something I have never done, not even once in my life. It is something I find degrading to my dignity," Berlusconi has said.
El Mahroug, better known as under her stage name 'Ruby the Heartstealer,' said in testimony that she never had sex with the former prime minister, but she lied to him about her age, saying she was 24.
Other legal woes have faced the former prime minister as well. Last month, an Italian appeals court in Milan upheld a four-year prison sentence for being convicted of tax evasion by a lower court last October..
