Clara Petacci while trying to escape. Clara Petacci Clara Petacci, known as Claretta Petacci (; 28 February 1912 – 28 April 1945), was a mistress of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, and was executed with him by partisans. Petacci had a long-standing relationship with Mussolini while he was married to Rachele Mussolini. Petacci was 28 years younger than him. Part of their correspondence is still the subject of a dispute with the National Archives, based on privacy. On 27 April 1945, Mussolini and Petacci were captured by partisans while traveling with a convoy of Italian Social Republic members. On 28 April, she
Walter Audisio but Audisio always claimed that he was the one who shot and killed the dictator and his mistress, Claretta Petacci. After the war Audisio continued working with the communist movement, and in 1948, was elected to the Italian Chamber of Deputies for Alessandria with the Italian Communist Party as part of the Popular Democratic Front. He supported the party until 1963, when he entered the Italian Senate. In 1968 he left to work for Italian gasoline company Eni. He died five years later in 1973 of a heart attack. His memoirs, titled "In nome del popolo italiano", were published two