PAOLO Liuzzo was Princess Beatrice's 'first love' and someone she cared about so deeply that she pushed to introduce him to the late Queen.
Sadly, the troubled playboy struggled with life after dating the princess in the early Noughties, before his suspected drugs overdose death this year aged just 41.
While Beatrice went on to find love with husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, Paolo was mired in controversy, from cocaine, sex and gambling scandals to a dark episode involving the death of a student.
Having inherited a fortune from his late father, the plastic resin tycoon Nico Liuzzo, the young Italian gained a reputation for hard partying and even compared his womanising to Pete Doherty's addiction to drugs.
After Paolo's death in a Miami hotel in February, his body was flown back to his native New York for a funeral - and friends told The Sun it was not a complete surprise that he had died young.
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A pal revealed: “Paolo was not doing great on a personal level. He loved to party and gamble.
"He began using a lot of pharmaceutical drugs but that later led to cocaine and harder drugs.
“It was a very fast lifestyle and we all feared it would catch up with him eventually.”
Pals also claimed the socialite's fast living and addiction to gambling landed him in deep debt despite his vast wealth, even owing debts to loan sharks.
Officials said that while the cause of death was unconfirmed, it was being "investigated as an overdose death".
'Shocking & embarrassing' scandals
Paolo was reportedly single at the time of his death, but his most famous romance was with Princess Beatrice, who he called 'Bea'.
After meeting in Jamaica in 2005, they started dating when she was 17 and he was in his early twenties.
Paolo then broke the news to Beatrice that three years earlier he had been charged with the manslaughter of a student who had died during a drunken brawl.
The charge was later downgraded to assault and battery, and he served a 100-hour community service sentence.
Despite Beatrice's love for Paolo, the relationship caused a headache for the Royal Family - particularly her parents, Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, who publicly tried to be supportive despite their reservations.
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After they invited him on holiday to Switzerland in 2006, however, it emerged that Liuzzo had flouted the conditions of his probation.
Beatrice was forced to end the romance when he was sent back to the US to have his three-year probation extended by the courts as punishment.
After the split, he further fanned the flames by claiming the princess and her sister Eugenie, then 15, had attended a party in Jamaica where guests smoked cannabis and took magic mushrooms.
A source tells The Sun: "Andrew did not approve of him, but did not want to alienate his darling daughter.
"It was only too obvious that Bea was head over heels in love with the guy, who was definitely on the wrong side of the tracks.
"However, her mother Sarah could see the situation needed careful handling [so they] were openly welcoming to Paolo, even when they began to hear about him getting into trouble and doing the kind of things they wanted to shield Bea from.
"They were shocked when they heard he had been using a lot of cocaine and had been seen with other women, and were embarrassed when he later claimed he had smoked marijuana in their presence."
'Love... but not IN love'
Paolo continued to enrage the royals as he opened up on his past relationship, revealing he had cheated on the princess with other women.
He told the Mail in 2007 Beatrice was so besotted that she had insisted she would "love [him] to meet Granny".
He said: "We'd started joking about getting married and having kids.
"I wasn't sure I wanted to get in that deep with Bea. I loved her but I wasn't in love with her.
"Sometimes another lady friend of mine would come over to my place at Eaton Square in London.
"It was just messing around, never anything more, and I felt so bad afterwards because of Bea.
He also added: "Bea wanted to fly to New York to visit my mother but, I'll be honest, I've never brought a woman back to my house to meet my family unless it was someone I would be proposing to."
'Women are my weakness'
Despite his high-profile romance with Beatrice, the self-confessed lothario admitted he struggled being tied down.
He once said about himself: "I’m not a bad person. But it’s like putting heroin in front of Pete Doherty.
"Women are my weakness."
Having inherited millions, Paolo was able to afford to live in luxury, once telling police his address was the prestigious Trump Tower in New York, where apartments sell for millions.
He made the admission in 2009 after being arrested in Australia, having crashed a £40,000 hired Audi while rumoured to be fleeing Jupiters Casino - where he apparently left without paying his bill.
He was charged with a string of offences, including possessing cocaine.
He had also failed to pay for accommodation and restaurant bills at a casino.
Sometimes another lady friend of mine would come over to my place. It was just messing around, never anything more, and I felt so bad afterwards because of Bea
Paolo
He pleaded guilty to motoring offences, fraud and cocaine possession and was fined £2,600.
No conviction was recorded but the magistrate blasted Liuzzo for his “cavalier” attitude to the court.
In the final years of his life, he had further brushes with the law, including multiple driving offences.
Mum-of-one Beatrice, now 35, is believed to have found out about Paolo's death shortly after her mother was diagnosed with skin cancer and was “heartbroken” by the news.
