The escorts called to facilitate ESA’s business were all luxury. Eunice, Diana Marcela, Sandy, South American and Eastern. Certainly well paid. Referring to one of the customers, one of them, Maria – who is intercepted – says to her friend Floriana: “That is, I pay the mortgage installment twice as soon as I see it.” And the other: “Me too, I pay the rent…”. Meetings «at Benedetti’s villa», «luxurious hotels or on the occasion of fairs and conferences». This is how the owner of the ESA himself, at the center of the investigation, defines them, speaking about them with Colonel Luca Corrieri: “Merry evenings”, “parties” for “officers” and “NCOs” with “a lot of hotness”. Among the precautions, there was, if anything, that of making certain meetings seem completely casual. A male voice explains it to Maria: “It absolutely must not, please, it absolutely must not come out that you are escorts.” For those affairs, which also extended to Puglia, it was Benedetti himself who contacted the escorts, who was also called to answer for exploitation of prostitution. The “call girls” were essential for his business, as can be understood from what he says to a woman who can get them for him: “I ask you… we have to do a search, down in Puglia, again from September because now… to an industrial area that I should buy.” He continues: «We can even do it for a month», «we need to make contacts, company presidents». She replied: “Um, come on, I’ll think about it… and see if anyone comes to mind.”
The investigation in 2014
The investigation into corruption surrounding the orders for the disposal of white phosphorus bombs began, rather quietly, several years ago, in 2014. A sports journalist who is really well-known in Reggio, Marco Gibertini, mentions it. Which however stumbles into the Aemilia investigation, the one which told every detail of how the ‘Ndrangheta progressively poisoned the city of the Tricolore. The man has close relations with the gangs and for this reason he is definitively condemned as a supporter, as well as expelled from the Order of Journalists. During the interrogations Gibertini talks about Enrico Benedetti. From the documents of the investigation coordinated by the Reggio Emilia prosecutor’s office and conducted by the provincial command of the Fiamme Gialle directed by Filippo Ivan Bixio we read that, according to the journalist, who however did not refer to “specific facts”, Benedetti would have been “a great corruptor”. Not only. The reporter remembered «having contacted some escorts, hired for an evening, on behalf of Benedetti» and in this regard he added that «he would have seen political figures at the “reception” villa» of the owner of the ESA.
Daughter Margherita
But Gibertini’s interrogation was not forgotten by investigators. Then, “reactivating the investigation in 2023”, to use the words of prosecutor Paci, they put the entrepreneur under surveillance and this morning, assisted by the lawyer Salvatore Mannino, he will be before the investigating judge Lugi Ramponi for the warrant interrogation. His daughter Margherita also appears in the papers, 32 years old, under investigation for corruption, who on “her father’s directive, while maintaining relationships, even convivial ones”, “had to personally take care of the various financial contributions”. Among these was the request of engineer Brindisi. Here’s how the woman vents to dad: “Now he wants us to buy him a lamp… a floor lamp… okay, I’ll buy it for him now.”
Tags: paid
