Raffaello Follieri blames his mistakes on ... Anne Hathaway?

"The road to Hell is paved with good intentions."

That's what Raffaello Follieri's lawyer had the gall to write in a letter to the judge on his client's behalf.

But maybe he should have written, "Anne Hathaway and her celebrity devil friends made him do it."

Follieri is due to be sentenced for various nefarious financial dealings on Oct. 23. His legal team is desperately trying to get a reduced sentence of three years. 

So natch, they have gotten lots of of folks speaking on his behalf about what a great dude he is and how he's got a sick mom. Yada, yada, yada.

But check out the letter with his character references and his lawyers' explanation about what happened to poor Raffaello when he fell in with the wrong rich-and-famous crowd.

His attorney writes:

"When he was only 24 years old, this young man from a small city in the South of Italy found himself a successful international entrepreneur befriended by the rich and famous. In a brief period of time, he was socializing with some of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world. He was surrounded by movie stars and celebrities and this young man, who neither drinks nor smokes, became intoxicated with it all. Unfortunately, he lacked the resources to maintain the opulent lifestyle of his new friends. Even more unfortunately, he had almost unfettered access to hundreds of thousands of dollars with few controls on his spending ability, until it was too late. Soon he succumbed to the temptation. The result was a colossal error in judgment which has had a devastating impact on Raffaello and those around him."

Oh, puh-lease. His "new friends," those darn movie stars and celebrities, made him embezzle money?

Photos: WireImage