Munich - Police are holding a man who attempted to extort money from Germany's richest woman, Susanne Klatten, by claiming he possessed a sexually compromising film of her, a prosecutor confirmed Saturday in Munich. However the man was believed to have no links to Ernano Barretta, the sect leader currently on trial in Italy over the alleged entrapment of Klatten. The gigolo, Helg Sgarbi, was sent to prison in March for six years.
The newspaper Muenchner Abendzeitung was set to report Saturday that the latest man to be arrested was apparently bluffing when he demanded 75,000 euros from Klatten, who inherited a substantial part of the BMW car company, as the price to keep the video secret.
"We assume he was freeloading and are convinced he did not possess any video," said the German prosecutor. The man, who was not identified, was in pretrial custody.
Sgarbi 44, admitted he seduced Klatten and three other women so he could sweet-talk them out of millions of euros. Klatten alone paid him 9 million euros (12 million dollars) before realising he was a fraud.
The trial was told that she and the other women gave funds to Sgarbi out of generosity, and did not succumb to blackmail pressure. At trial, Sgarbi refused to say what had become of the alleged videos or to testify about any accomplices he may have had.
