According to a court in Livorno, Italy, Rossignolo and his associates received €7.5 million (about $9.1 million) from the government of Italy's Piedmonte region to pay for training courses for the over 1,000 employees that worked at the De Tomaso plant.
To add insult to injury, some of De Tomaso's ex-employees are still waiting to receive some of the back wages that the company owes them.
An ex-Fiat executive, Rossignolo is over 70 years old and will not serve any jail time but he has been placed under house arrest. His two associates are younger and they were put behind bars yesterday afternoon by Italy's Guardia di Finanza.
De Tomaso, a small Italian company that specialized in making luxury and sports cars, declared bankruptcy a week ago after a last-minute deal to sell the company to a Chinese group called Hotyork fell through. This marks the second time that the company has filed for bankruptcy in about a decade.
