Italian police said Monday they had arrested a businessman who had ties to the former premier Silvio Berlusconi for ordering a bomb attack targeting prominent television journalist Sigfrido Ranucci last year.
Rome's carabinieri police said Valter Lavitola, supposedly a friend of Ranucci, was the "alleged mastermind" behind the October 16 attack outside the journalist's home.
He is accused of having instructed a second man, Tavares Gomes Clesio, to recruit four men arrested in June who are accused of actually placing the bomb, police said.
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"Lavitola is suspected of having conceived the criminal plan, instructing Gomes to identify individuals capable of procuring the explosives and carrying out a demonstrative attack in front of the journalist's villa," they said.
