Italian police are searching for six young Russians who vanished from an elite Sardinian nightclub without paying their 86,000 euro ($124,500) tab, news reports said Tuesday.
The group sailed in on a 70-meter luxury yacht so impressive that Billionaire club staff accepted their anonymous reservations. Once inside, the freeloaders ordered 90 bottles of Cristal champagne at 900 euros per bottle, drinking some and spraying some on each other in what witnesses said was a lively night of partying.
"The club was full of big spenders, and the Russians seemed no different," the club's spokeswoman, Patrizia Spinelli, told Britain's Guardian newspaper.
The young Russians promised to pay the following day — as is common practice — but were nowhere to be found when club staff showed up to collect the bill.
Now the six are in hot water with the authorities along with the captain of the Kismet, who signed for the check, and the Nautica charter company, which guaranteed it.
"We have seen people here skip out on drinks bills before, but never this much," investigator Giulio Brandanu told the Guardian.
Billionaire, part-owned by motor-racing tycoon Flavio Briatore, is a favorite hangout of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi — who owns a villa nearby — and celebrities like American rocker Lenny Kravitz.
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