'Swiss Gigolo'
-------------------
MUNICH - A MAN dubbed the 'Swiss Gigolo' admitted on Monday cheating and blackmailing a string of super-rich lovers, including Germany's richest woman, out of millions of euros.
The long list of charges covering four different women including BMW heiress Susanne Klatten are 'in essence' accurate, 44-year-old Helg Sgarbi's lawyer told the court on the first day of his trial in the German city of Munich.
At first the married mother-of-three spurned Sgarbi's advances but began an affair when the smooth-talking Sgarbi turned up unexpectedly in the south of France where she was on holiday the following month.
Later in August 2007 they met in a Holiday Inn hotel in Munich - where Ms Klatten believed she would not run the risk of bumping into any acquaintances - for an 'intimate' encounter that Sgarbi secretly filmed, according to the charges.
... more
Sgarbi is accused of cheating Ms Klatten out of seven million euros (S$13.6 million) and trying to blackmail her for 49 million euros, saying he had video footage of their steamy hotel encounters.
Sgarbi, who told his wealthy conquests he was a 'special Swiss representative in crisis zones' according to the charges against him, now faces the prospect of up to 10 years in prison.
According to prosecutors, Sgarbi first met Ms Klatten, who reputedly has a personal fortune running to several billion euros, at the exclusive Austrian health resort of Lanserhof in July 2007.
The blonde Klatten, 46, is the daughter of the late Herbert Quandt, the German industrialist who saved BMW from collapse in 1957 and built the Bavarian carmaker into a world auto power.
Before Monday's hearing began, a spokesman for the Munich prosecutors' office told news channel NTV that Sgarbi faced a prison sentence of several years but that he could expect some leniency if he were to plead guilty.
'If he makes a confession, if he spares his victims from having to appear here in public, he will get a corresponding reduction ... in his sentence,' Anton Winkler said. -- AFP
