Jorge Hinojosa
FRANCESCO Meloni, father of far right Italian politician and winner of the recent general election Giorgia Meloni, was once jailed for what was at the time the Balearics’ biggest drug seizure.
He was arrested on September 25, 1995 after police discovered he was transporting 1,500 kilos of hashish in a yacht.
A Palma court sentenced him to nine years in prison for narcotrafficking.
Spanish newspaper Diario de Mallorca revealed that he had confessed to carrying the hash in the boat at a trial held in summer of 1996 at the Palma Provincial court.
He was traveling on the yacht with the sons of his then partner and his son in law – they were sentenced to four years jail.
However, Meloni confessed in court that only he knew that the boat was full of drugs.
The prosecutor revealed that Meloni loaded the drug shipment from another boat while moored off Morocco.
Heintended to transport the narcotics to Italy, but due to a heavy storm he stopped in Menorca where suspicious Spanish police searched the yacht.
Police seized 7.5 million Italian lira (€3,890), 74,000 pesetas (€445) and £45.
Giorgia Meloni’s father had settled in Spain 40 years ago, first in the Canary Islands and then in Mallorca where he stood for office on the electoral list of the political party Escaños en Blanco.
He admitted in court that the reason he was transporting drugs was because he had lost his business, which was a hotel in the Canary Islands and he needed to clear debts.
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