Businessman acquitted of 76,000-euro tax evasion

(ANSA) – Aosta, December 11 – A northern Italian businessman on Wednesday was acquitted of tax evasion despite failing to pay 76,000 euros of taxes to the State in 2009.

A judge in Aosta, a city near Italy’s western Alps, found 54-year-old Pierino Fratallone not guilty of failing to turnover value added tax (VAT), because the effects of the economic crisis on his children’s supply business were accepted as ‘force majeure’.