Mario Adinolfi placed under house arrest: fraud of €4.7 million and tax evasion
The leader of the Popolo della Famiglia is accused of aggravated fraud and unlicensed financial activity through a betting group on social media. The confirmed damage exceeds €4.7 million.
Adinolfi under house arrest for "collective betting": million-euro fraud and failure to declare income
Mario Adinolfi, a journalist and leader of the Popolo della Famiglia, is under house arrest on charges of aggravated and continuing fraud, unlicensed exercise of savings collection activity, unlicensed financial activity and failure to declare income. As reported by Il Fatto Quotidiano — Cronaca, the Guardia di Finanza executed the measure as part of an investigation conducted by the Public Prosecutor's Office of Rome, which centres on a betting group called "collective betting".
The scheme, devised and promoted through social networks, involved the collection of money from private individuals with the promise of returns of up to 40 per cent annually linked to sports betting. For several participants, however, those sums were never returned. The Public Prosecutor's Office collected approximately ten statements from people who sought justice, initiating documentary acquisitions and banking and tax checks that led to the issue of the precautionary measure.
The system and the role of public notoriety
According to the investigators — officers of the Financial Investigation Unit of the Judicial Police Section of the Guardia di Finanza at the Public Prosecutor's Office of Rome and the Economic and Financial Police Unit Rome — the system exploited Adinolfi's perceived credibility as a politician, journalist and founder of associations linked to family and traditional values. The promise of high and guaranteed returns, well above market rates, was combined with the alleged use of algorithms and betting strategies presented as infallible.
In this way, clients were induced to hand over sums of up to over €100,000 each for the purchase of participation quotas.
The €4.7 million shortfall
The reconstruction of financial movements on Adinolfi's bank accounts enabled investigators to quantify the damage: over €4.7 million, of which only part was traceable to actual sports betting activities. The bulk of the sums was directed to other uses, including transfers to third parties and personal expenses for the purchase of luxury goods: watches, gold bars and foreign coins, paintings, boats and payments for travel.
Investigators also contested tax evasion of a further €400,000. A decree of preventive seizure is being executed for the sum evaded, corresponding to the profit obtained by Adinolfi in the course of a single tax year.
Risk of reoffending and the new "Cristo Regna" initiative
In the order for precautionary custody signed by Rome's investigating judge Giulia Arcieri, the precautionary requirements are justified by the "concrete and current danger of reiteration of criminal conduct of the same type as that for which proceedings are taking place". After conduct sustained for 15-20 years, Adinolfi reportedly recently collected over €3,000 through a new initiative called "Cristo Regna", which — according to the investigating judge — "would appear to reproduce, with the same methods as the previous one, in an unlicensed manner, the collection of capital regarding which, on the basis of what has emerged so far, it is reasonably feared that he could again defraud other victims and reiterate tax offences."
The investigating judge emphasises that Adinolfi's social danger derives from the systematicity of the conduct, "carried out over an extended period of time, involving a plurality of injured parties who, at different times, made payments to the investigated party according to similar methods", and increased by his public notoriety and media exposure.
The danger of evidence tampering
Arcieri further justifies the precautionary measure with the risk of evidence tampering: according to the investigating judge, Adinolfi "could approach the subjects who have already filed complaints and induce them to retract (fully or partially)", given that some of them would be vulnerable subjects, either due to compromised health conditions or from a financial perspective, "having invested all their capital in the operation promoted by the investigated party". Leaving him at liberty, Arcieri writes, "could affect the genuineness of the evidence", especially as the investigation involves the collection of statements from further injured parties and the acquisition of banking and tax documentation relating to financial flows still under reconstruction.
The precedent with Le Iene and rejected accusations
The case of the collective betting had already come to public attention thanks to an investigation by the television programme Le Iene. Last April, Adinolfi and the programme's correspondent Filippo Roma had come into direct contact in Prato, in a public confrontation during which the leader of the Popolo della Famiglia had pulled the journalist's hair and announced a defamation lawsuit.
Previously, Adinolfi had rejected the accusations, citing bureaucratic delays and anti-money laundering checks to justify the failed payments and continuous postponements.
In the order, the investigating judge describes Adinolfi as "dangerous, also as emerges from the television interviews on file, his attitude of denial of the debts incurred and statements about the alleged falsity of the complaints filed against him — which, indeed, in the present proceedings appear truthful as corroborated by the transfers executed and the emails exchanged between the parties to the agreement — which show that the investigated party, far from distancing himself from possible errors of the past, persists with determination in deception".
Source: Il Fatto Quotidiano - Cronaca