ROME: A lonely Italian millionaire who befriended the mother superior from her local convent believed she had found a companion in her dying days.

Now police are investigating the possibility that the nun - who offered the woman prayers and comfort - was more interested in the dying woman's money and forged her will to help herself after she died.

A nun in Italy is under investigation after a wealthy benefactor left everything to her convent.

Sister Angela Gramegna is being investigated by police on suspicion of fraudulently pocketing €1.5 million ($1.9 million) and getting the keys to an apartment in an upmarket neighbourhood in Rome. Investigators have seized the apartment and placed Sister Gramegna under investigation after calligraphy experts decided she wrote and signed the will in which her apparent benefactor, Francesca Di Cesare, left everything she owned to the convent.

Alone with no living relatives in Trieste, a leafy neighbourhood in north-east Rome, Ms Di Cesare turned to the nuns of the order of the Ancelle Sacro Cuore for support before she died in 2007, even moving into their convent for the last days of her life.