Financier suicide finding

Press, 25 July 1986, Page 6

Financier suicide finding

Magistrates investigating the mysterious death in jail of a Sicilian financier, Michele Sindona, have concluded that he committed suicide by drinking poison with his breakfast coffee, judicial sources say.

Sindona died, aged 65, •on March 22, two days after swallowing cyanide in his cell in a top security prison in northern Italy and four days after being sentenced to life in jail for ordering a contract murder. Sindona went into his cell bathroom, out of sight of his guards, to drink the coffee and cried out, “They have poisoned me,” before collapsing in agony. But the sources said a report by a deputy public prosecutor, Giovanni Battista Simoni, had concluded that the death was suicide and that there was no evidence to suggest homicide.

Mr Simoni’s report and his recommendation that the case should be shelved has been sent to a senior magistrate for a final decision. The sources said it was likely to be merely accepted and rubber-stamped. Despite the end of the investigation, controversy will continue over who was able to penetrate the extraordinary screen of security measures around the financier and smuggle the cyanide in to him. Sindona walked the corridors of power and was courted by cardinals and top politicians until the collapse of his banking empire in 1974. He was jailed for a total of 40 years for frauds on both sides of the Atlantic before being sentenced to life in prison just before his death. «