Eight hundred million masks irregular and dangerous to health, used by doctors in full emergency Covid. Protective devices paid for by the commissioner structure led by Dominic Arcuri with substantial advances, before the compliance checks required by law. A supply paid for one billion and 251 million euros with the special funds of the Prime Minister, preceded by a negotiation in which the Italian brokers, who collected six-figure commissions from the Hong Kong companies, were not mentioned, even if the law required reporting. For these choices, which have led to a position of “financial advantage” for suppliers, the prosecutor has now requested the trial of Arcuri, four companies and eleven other people, including Antonio Fabbrocini, sole manager of the procedure, who, in addition to to answer for abuse of office, like the former commissioner, he will also have to defend himself against the accusation of fraud in public supplies and forgery in public deed, for having induced “the Cts to falsely certify the compliance of imported medical devices with the standards”.
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THE ACCUSATIONS
According to the investigations of the Finance currency police unit, the purchase of over 800 million masks, during the first dramatic wave of infections (May-July 2020) would have taken place with the mediation of some Italian companies thanks to the privileged relationship between Arcuri and Mario Benotti, the ex-journalist now accused of trafficking in influences, who allegedly obtained from the commissioner an exclusivity in brokering supplies. Thus the entrepreneur Vincenzo Andrea Tommasi would have been accredited to the commissioner, to whom he was assured of selecting, through his “Sunsky spa” the Chinese companies, to which the structure would have placed the order, and of maintaining relations between the government and the companies for logistics, transport and the solution of document anomalies “without any formal assignment or written contract so as to be able to collect commissions from the prices paid by the government, without any public control”. Tommasi would have acted in collaboration with Nicolas Venanzi and through the mediation of the other suspects would have turned to three Chinese consortia. The charges range from receiving stolen goods to money laundering, as well as public procurement fraud. Because the brokers investigated thus obtained over 70 million commissions from the Chinese.
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THE ADVANCES
According to the reconstruction of the monetary police nucleus of the Finance, Arcuri and Fabbrocini allegedly “intentionally omitted to formalize and disclose the mediation relationship that the commissioner structure established and maintained with Tommasi” who, in this way would not have had responsibility for the enormous quantity of masks that were found to be dangerous because they did not actually protect against the virus. Not only that, Arcuri and Fabbrocini allegedly «granted to the Chinese companies indicated by Tommasi advance payments before each check in Italy on the quality of the supplies and the validity of the accompanying documents. Precisely at a time when – as stated in the request for indictment signed by prosecutor Gennaro Varone – all the other Italian importers were denied advance payments, forcing them to purchase the devices to be supplied at their own expense, with payment to verification of the goods in Italy, thus rationing the offer in favor of Tommasi.
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