"The Trial" Continued: QPR Chairman, Gianni Paladini Tells The Jury

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TRIAL (Continued) - May 8, 2006

QPR Chairman, Gianni Paladini today started telling the jury what happened the day.


Ananova - QPR director tells of gun ordeal
A football club boss wept as he told a jury how he was ordered to resign at gunpoint by a rival.
Gianni Paladini, 60, the majority shareholder at Queens Park Rangers, claimed his "frightening" ordeal began when fellow director David Morris asked if he could have a word minutes before the start of a home game.
"He said he needed to talk about some shares," the father-of-two explained. But no sooner had he been led into the chief executive's suite at the Loftus Road ground and sat down than a "large white man" also entered. Several other men - all "hired muscle" according to the Crown - immediately followed and quickly surrounded him. "Then I knew I was in trouble," he told London's Blackfriars Crown Court.
At that point, he claimed, Morris became "very aggressive", pulled some documents from his jacket pocket and told him to sign and resign from the club board.
"I was very frightened," Mr Paladini insisted.
"I didn't know why this was happening. I said, 'David, why are you doing this to me?' It was crazy.
"Then the man at the back of me told me, 'Come on sign, sign or we will kill you.' The man next to me then said, 'We are serious people, we don't mess about.' He tried to use Italian saying, "Capiche?" that means 'do you understand?'"
Mr Paladini told jurors that at that point a black man in front of him pulled a gun from his pocket and laid it on a table.
"The man behind me then pressed something into the back of my head which I thought might be a gun while the one sitting next to me punched me in the stomach and said he wanted me to sign the papers. But I didn't want to."
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1834722.html


AP - QPR director tells of gun ordeal
Press Association Monday May 8, 2006
QPR director tells of gun ordeal
Press Association Monday May 8, 2006 2:58 PM
A football club boss wept as he told a jury how he was ordered to resign at gunpoint by a rival.
Gianni Paladini, 60, the majority shareholder at Queens Park Rangers, claimed his "frightening" ordeal began when fellow director David Morris asked if he could have a word minutes before the start of a home game.
"He said he needed to talk about some shares," the father-of-two explained. But no sooner had he been led into the chief executive's suite at the Loftus Road ground and sat down than a "large white man" also entered. Several other men - all "hired muscle" according to the Crown - immediately followed and quickly surrounded him. "Then I knew I was in trouble," he told London's Blackfriars Crown Court.
At that point, he claimed, Morris became "very aggressive", pulled some documents from his jacket pocket and told him to sign and resign from the club board.
"I was very frightened," Mr Paladini insisted.
"I didn't know why this was happening. I said, 'David, why are you doing this to me?' It was crazy.
"Then the man at the back of me told me, 'Come on sign, sign or we will kill you.' The man next to me then said, 'We are serious people, we don't mess about.' He tried to use Italian saying, "Capiche?" that means 'do you understand?'"
Mr Paladini told jurors that at that point a black man in front of him pulled a gun from his pocket and laid it on a table.
"The man behind me then pressed something into the back of my head which I thought might be a gun while the one sitting next to me punched me in the stomach and said he wanted me to sign the papers. But I didn't want to."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-5807790,00.html