Investigators say Berlusconi paid 10 'new women' – update

(ANSA) - Milan, March 26 - Former premier Silvio Berlusconi was paying 10 "new young women" sums totaling 2,500 euros a month, according to reports from investigators.
    Accountant Giuseppe Spinelli was in charge of the payments to the women who reportedly attended parties at the three-time premier's home and who are not officially under investigation, according to the documents released on Thursday.
    Along with the new women listed as receiving monthly payments by Spinelli, a trusted manager of Berlusconi, was also ex-Lombardy regional councilor Nicole Minetti of former Berlusconi's now-defunct center-right People of Freedom (PdL) party, who was listed as receiving 15,000 euros a month.
    Minetti, the ex-premier's former dental hygienist, was sentenced to three years in jail by an appeals court in Milan last November for procuring prostitutes for Berlusconi's sex parties at his private residence in Arcore, near Milan.
    Judicial sources in a probe into alleged perjury by so-called 'bunga bunga' witnesses said earlier this month that Berlusconi gave over two million euros from 2010 to early 2014 to another group of young women who attended his parties.
    These sums did not include money given to an alleged underage prostitute known as Ruby the Heartstealer, whose real name is Karima El Mahroug, who attended the sex parties.
    Investigators have said Berlusconi is still paying Ruby and other alleged prostitutes in exchange for their silence about the real nature of his bunga bunga sex parties.
    The ex-premier is also alleged to have paid for an expensive birthday party for the baby daughter of Ruby, who prosecutors believe worked as an underage prostitute when she attended the parties in 2010.