Two top execs acquitted by Italian court in Agusta case

MILAN/NEW DELHI: An Italian appeals court on Monday acquitted two former top bosses of Italian defence and aerospace giant Leonardo over corruption charges in the now-scrapped deal for selling 12 Agusta-Westland helicopters to the Indian government for ~3,600 crore.

Milan’s third court of appeal acquitted Giuseppe Orsi, the former president of the company earlier known as Finmeccanica, and Bruno Spagnolini, the former CEO of its British subsidiary Agusta-Westland, PTI said quoting Italian news agency ANSA.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), however, said their acquittal will not affect the agency’s independent probe into allegations that Leonardo paid more than ~360 crores as bribe to Indian officials to secure the contract. Orsi was arrested in 2014 and resigned as chief executive of Finmeccanica, which was later renamed as Leonardo.

While Orsi was given a jail term of four-and-a-half-years, Spagnolini was jailed for four years on the same charges.

Orsi was at the helm of AgustaWestland when the deal was struck and was suspected of involvement in the payment of bribes. Both were cleared on charges of committing international corruption at the first-instance trial in 2014 but convicted of false invoicing. In India, the CBI last year charged former Indian Air Force (IAF) chief SP Tyagi in a Delhi court along with nine others for bribery in the case. “We have had a completely different probe. We have very strong case,” CBI spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said in Delhi on Monday. Another CBI official said the agency had “conducted an independent investigation into the case” and added that the “prosecution have the option to file an appeal against the judgment”. The contract was scrapped by the previous UPA government in 2014.