Former wife of SC congressman, now Italian princess, evicted from $158M Roman mansion

When the police came, Princess Rita Boncompagni Ludovisi gathered up her four dogs and walked out of the 30,000 square-foot Roman villa she’s called home for 20 years.

The former wife of a South Carolina congressman told waiting reporters, “What did I do to deserve this? It’s a mystery to me – why are they so intent on getting me out of here?” The Guardian reported.

She told The State Thursday she had gone to the home of a friend, Princess Pia Ruspoli, outside Rome.

“Now I really have a deepened empathy for people who are evicted,” she said.

Her Ukrainian housekeeper, the housekeeper’s daughter and two children also left. The daughter and her children had been living with Ludovisi since they fled Ukraine last year.

The eviction is part of a longstanding feud between Ludovisi and the three sons of her late husband, Prince Nicolò Boncompagni Ludovis. He died in 2018, leaving a 50% stake in the Villa Aurora to his wife as well as the right to live there until she died.

The Guardian reported that Bante Boncompagni Ludovisi, the youngest of Nicolò’s three sons, waited outside the villa on Thursday morning to watch it “being liberated from that woman.”

“Princess is not her title!” he yelled.

He claimed his father was out of his mind when he wrote the will, The Guardian reported.

The 500-year-old villa in the heart of Rome has been put up for auction several times at the order of the court, but no bids were placed.

The first asking price was $500 million. It was built in 1570 by Francesco del Nero, a member of a rich Florentine family and a treasurer of pope Clement VII.

Neglected for years, the villa holds antiquities and masterpieces — a statue of the Greek god Pan attributed to Michelangelo, a rare Caraviaggio mural, which represents most of the value of the house.

Galileo, Goethe, Tchaikovsky were visitors to the estate that once covered almost 90 acres. At one time the property held the home of Julius Caesar.

The Ludovisi family has owned the villa since 1621.

Another auction is scheduled for June 30. The asking price is now $158 million.

To South Carolinians, Ludovisi is better known as Rita Jenrette, wife of U.S. Rep. John Jenrette of South Carolina’s Pee Dee, She was married to Jenrette for five years while he was an up and coming congressman. He served three terms before losing after he got caught up in what was known as ABSCAM, an FBI sting operation to uncover political corruption.

Thirty-one public officials were targeted for the investigation, in which FBI agents posed as representatives of a fictional Abdul Enterprises, Ltd., owned by an Arab sheik. They were offered money for votes on government contracts benefiting the sheik.

Five congressmen, including Jenrette were convicted of bribery and corruption.

She was a flamboyant figure in Washington, especially among the staid congressional wives who were alarmed when they learned the Jenrettes had had sex outside the Capitol. She later said that was not true.

Jenrette spent 13 months in federal prison. His wife divorced him and moved to Los Angeles, where she made movies and was a reporter for “A Current Affair” television show.

She then moved to New York where she had a six- and seven-figure income as a real estate broker before meeting the prince In 2003 and moving to Rome.

She said Friday she did not know where she would go now. She’s thought of Paris or New York.

“I am in shock,” she said. “Stunned.”

She and her husband spent years restoring the mansion, including replacing the roof that birds flew into the house through, but much remains to be done.

“It will take a billionaire, not a millionaire,” she said.

Princess Ludovisi has also digitized the family archive, some of which was found in a locked trunk. T. Corey Brennan, a classics professor at Rutgers University who is helping her, has said they have accumulated some 150,000 pages of material.

They found “revealing” letters from Marie Antoinette in perfect condition, he said.

They have gathered some of the material into a book that will be published in late 2023 by Brepols, which specializes in fine books on the humanities..

The book is dedicated to the prince.