'Fake trust funds, donations' in Agnelli case - GIP

(ANSA) - ROME, SEP 24 - Two "fictitious" trust funds at the Bahamas and "fake donations" of artwork and precious objects worth 170 million euros were among "new" investigative evidence on the fortune owned by the late Marella Carocciolo, Gianni Agnelli's widow who died in 2019, mentioned by Turin's tribunal in a decree last week that ordered the preventive seizure of 74 million euros of assets from her three grandchildren and two other people under investigation.
    Investigators believe they were part of mechanisms to reduce Caracciolo's inheritance and pay less taxes.
    Last week, the Turin court ordered the seizure as part of its investigation into Gianni Agnelli's inheritance.
    The assets were seized from Stellantis Chairman John Elkann, who is also the CEO of the Agnelli family holding company Exor and the Ferrari chairman, his siblings Lapo and Ginevra, Turin accountant Gianluca Ferrero and Swiss notary Urs Robert Von Gruenigen.
    In February the Turin public prosecutor's office opened a probe over the tax treatment of the annuity that the late Gianni Agnelli's daughter and Elkann's mother Margherita paid to her mother and Agnelli's wife Marella under agreements made in 2004.
    Fraud against the state in relation to inheritance tax is reportedly among the alleged crimes being probed.
    Von Grunigen was the executor of Marella's will. (ANSA).