Trento, 13 June (LaPresse) – The Vienna Public Prosecutor’s Office for Economic Affairs and Corruption has opened another investigation into René Benko, who has been in custody since 23 January last year in connection with the billion-euro collapse of the Signa Group, of which he was the head. It is understood that the alleged offence facing the former property magnate is bankruptcy fraud. According to investigators, Benko was the ‘holder of power and the beneficial owner of the Laura Foundation’, a charitable organisation set up by the family of the former Tyrolean tycoon, ‘used to divert €10 million from the personal insolvency proceedings’. Investigators suspect that Benko concealed, and thus diverted from the bankruptcy estate, assets such as “high-value firearms, furnishings, a luxury sports car and other valuable items and personal property, or that he concealed ownership of them”. The investigations are continuing, as confirmed by the Vienna Public Prosecutor’s Office, because Benko may “have reduced the guarantee fund for creditors through donations, unjustified advances and by concealing his own claims”. Benko is also under investigation by the Trento Public Prosecutor’s Office as part of a major inquiry into alleged links between politics and business capable of influencing public contracts.