One night in Silvio Berlusconi’s 'harem'

Former escort girl tells of dinner party at Italian premier's home, where he showed off to female guests then took her to bed.

ON the night of Barack Obama’s election as US president last November, Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, threw a candlelit dinner party for three beautiful women at Palazzo Grazioli, his luxurious residence in Rome. One of the guests, a former actress and escort girl called Patrizia D’Addario, 42, says he then asked her to stay the night. Not only that, but she claims to have taped the conversation that followed. “Go and wait for me in the big bed,” the 72-year-old billionaire is said to have told her. He was going to have a shower and change into a bathrobe. An extract from D’Addario’s tape that was leaked to an Italian newspaper and published yesterday shows that she replied: “Yes, the big bed.”

According to D’Addario, Berlusconi’s staff reminded him that he was expected at an election night rally organised by the Italy-USA Foundation, but the prime minister stayed at home. Officials informed him later of Obama’s victory. The next day, D’Addario says, she and Berlusconi breakfasted together and he gave her a multicoloured tortoise encrusted with precious stones, declaring: “The tortoise is a special gift I give only to you.” Her account is the latest in a series of claims about Berlusconi’s private life that have embarrassed him and threatened to undermine his authority as he prepares to host a G8 summit next month. He has described D’Addario’s claims as “trash and falsehood”. “I will not be swayed by these attacks and will continue to work for the good of the country,” he said. D’Addario’s story has been supported by her friend Barbara Montereale, 23, a hostess who claims to have accompanied her to the dinner party on November 4 and to a similar event two weeks earlier. Montereale disclosed in Italian newspaper interviews yesterday that D’Addario told her she had sex with Berlusconi on the night of Obama’s victory.

Continue ...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article6544035.ece