Celebrity News

Model who accused Weinstein of molestation has sued before

This stunner is no stranger to sexually charged lawsuits.

Harvey Weinstein’s accuser, Ambra Battilana, once sued a 70-year-old sugar daddy, claiming he sexually assaulted her, according to Italian reports.

The suit emerged when Battilana became a witness against then-Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was tried in 2011 on charges he’d had sex with an underage prostitute. He was eventually acquitted.

During the trial, she was asked about her 2010 complaint against the much older man, according to Il Giornale, which is owned by Berlusconi’s brother, Paolo Berlusconi.

The complaint claimed Battilana, now 22, had had an affair with the entrepreneur, identified only as “Mr. G,” who paid her to be with him when she was younger than 18.

Battilana claimed she was “forced against my will” into having sex with the wealthy businessman, Italian reports said.

Ambra Battilana with her lawyer at the trial of former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in 2013.Getty Images
Silvio BerlusconiGetty Images
Harvey WeinsteinWireImage

“He invited me to ride in his car,” she said in the complaint, according to the Daily Mail, as translated from Italian.

“Upset by the invitation because of my inexperience and very young age, he induced me to accept out of politeness. To my enormous embarrassment, he began to ask me questions about my sexual preferences and to tell me about his erotic fantasies.”

He caressed her left leg and handed her a bag filled with 2,000 euros (about $2,100), promising there would be much more if she became his “playmate,” Battilana claimed.

“Despite the indecency of the proposal, both because of my psychological subjection in which I found myself and because of the severe poverty of my family, I felt forced against my will not to refuse the money,” she said.

Battilana eventually went to a school psychologist, who told her the relationship wasn’t normal.

“So I got very angry and went to the lawyer,” she said in court, Il Fatto Quotidiano reported.

In 2011, Mr. G admitted they’d had a consensual relationship and he’d given her gifts.

“Yes, it’s true, I have known Ambra,” he told Il Giornale. “We met the first time in a restaurant and then we started seeing each other.”

But there was no sexual ­assault, he insisted. He said he gave her thousands of euros “to buy clothes, to pay for the apartment during the holidays for her and her family.”

Mr. G said he spent even more money when she became a finalist in the Miss Italia competition in 2010.

While the result of the suit is unclear, Italian prosecutors asked that the complaint be dropped since the model never talked to investigators. But it came up when Battilana was cross-examined as a witness in a trial against Berlusconi, where she told of his orgy parties.

Battilana claimed Berlusconi touched her bottom and encouraged her to take off her clothes during the sex party.

When Battilana said she was leaving, Berlusconi associate Emilio Fede warned her she would never get the TV job she wanted, she claimed.

Battilana and another former beauty queen sued Fede and two others accused of procuring prostitutes for Berlusconi, seeking about $400,000 in damages. They claimed they lost jobs when they became associated with Berlusconi’s so-called “bunga-bunga” parties.

When asked about details of the lawsuit, Battilana’s attorney, Mark Jay Heller, would say only that he was “shocked and dismayed to learn of these allegations,” adding, “The young lady that I represent impresses me as a perfectly appropriate young woman who appears only to be motivated to obtain justice.”