Prosecution calls witnesses as Vatican finance trial resumes

Hannah Brockhaus   By Hannah Brockhaus for CNA

September 30, 2022 Catholic News Agency News Briefs 2 Print

 

null / Vatican Media.

Rome Newsroom, Sep 30, 2022 / 08:37 am (CNA).

After a break of over two months, the Vatican trial on financial corruption in the Secretariat of State continued this week with the interrogation of witnesses for the prosecution.

The court reconvened Sept. 28, 29, and 30, to begin the questioning of the first of what the prosecution expects to be a total of 41 witnesses it will call.

The witness list includes Vatican gendarme Stefano De Santis, who assisted the Vatican’s now chief Prosecutor Alessandro Diddi during the trial’s preliminary investigation; he is expected to testify at the next scheduled hearing on October 12.

A British-Italian architect, Luciano Capaldo, has been called to testify by the prosecution the same week. Capaldo was the registered director of the holding company London 60 SA Ltd, through which the Secretariat of State controlled the London property after its purchase.

The building at 60 Sloane Avenue in London is at the center of the Vatican’s historic corruption trial, which began at the end of July 2021.

The Vatican has charged 10 people with crimes, including Cardinal Angelo Becciu, the former second-ranking official at the Secretariat of State. Becciu was questioned in May.

The London investment property was purchased by the secretariat in stages over several years for a reported £350 million pounds.

In July, the Vatican confirmed the London building had been sold to Bain Capital for £186 million ($223.6 million).

The Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA) reported that the losses from the sale were absorbed by the savings of the Secretariat of State and therefore did not touch the pope’s charitable fund, Peter’s Pence.

The hearing on Wednesday consisted of the second half of the questioning of defendant Fabrizio Tirabassi, a former official at the Secretariat of State.

Thursday’s audience opened with the questioning of defendant Nicola Squillace, the lawyer of businessman and fellow defendant Gianluigi Torzi.

In the course of the trial, the only defendants who have not taken the stand are Gianluigi Torzi and Cecilia Marogna.

The Sept. 29 hearing then continued with the first witness, Roberto Lolato, who was called to testify for the prosecution as an expert witness.

Prosecutors asked Lolato to examine the financial operations carried out by the Secretariat of State in relation to the purchase of the London building as a technical consultant.

On Friday, the Vatican’s auditor general, Alessandro Cassinis Righini, testified.

Righini had been acting auditor general since June 2017 and full auditor since May 2021.

He succeeded Libero Milone, who served as auditor general from 2015 until he was dismissed in 2017, just two years into a five-year mandate.

Milone was hired as the Vatican’s first auditor general in a move to introduce more financial transparency in the Vatican City State.

Three months after stepping down, Milone claimed that he was “threatened” into resignation by an “old guard” opposed to his work and accused Cardinal Becciu of targeting him after he launched an investigation into a possible conflict of interest.

A Sept. 30 statement from Becciu’s lawyer, Fabio Viglione, claimed the suspension of the PricewaterhouseCoopers audit in April 2016 “was not an autonomous choice of the then-sostituto Monsignor Becciu, but a position taken by the Secretariat of State.”

Righini was questioned Sept. 30 about the external audit ordered by Cardinal George Pell, then prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, and reportedly opposed by Becciu.

He also answered questions about meetings he took part in with secretariat officials regarding financial investments.

Righini said he was surprised that the Secretariat of State considered making an investment in an oil company in Angola given its evident conflict with the teachings of Pope Francis in his environmental encyclical Laudato si (the investment eventually fell through).

Funds originally earmarked for the Angola investment were reportedly rerouted into the London building purchase.

The auditor general said Pope Francis did not know anything about the London investment. But later, under additional questioning, he revised his statement to say he could not be 100% certain the pope knew nothing.

If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!

Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.

About Catholic News Agency 10371 Articles
Catholic News Agency (www.catholicnewsagency.com)

Related Articles

No Picture
News Briefs

Irish president honors WWII hero Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty at the Vatican

October 20, 2023 Catholic News Agency 1
When the Nazis occupied Rome for nine months following the fall of Mussolini, Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty created what came to be known as the “Rome Escape Line.” / Patrick Leonard/EWTN

Vatican City, Oct 20, 2023 / 09:40 am (CNA).

Many people know Irish Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty from Hollywood’s portrayal of his life in “The Scarlet and the Black,” the film based on a real-life Catholic hero who was honored at the Vatican this week. 

Ireland’s President Michael Higgins in a Vatican ceremony on Oct. 19 paid tribute to O’Flaherty, an Irish priest who hid Italian Jews from the Nazis and went on to baptize the former head of the Gestapo in Rome.

When the Nazis occupied Rome for nine months following the fall of Mussolini, Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty created what came to be known as the "Rome Escape Line." Credit: Patrick Leonard/EWTN
When the Nazis occupied Rome for nine months following the fall of Mussolini, Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty created what came to be known as the “Rome Escape Line.” Credit: Patrick Leonard/EWTN

The wreath-laying ceremony marked the 60th anniversary of O’Flaherty’s death on Oct. 30, 1963. The ceremony took place in the Vatican’s Teutonic Cemetery, where a plaque commemorates O’Flaherty as a “tireless defender of the weak and oppressed” who saved more than 6,000 lives during World War II. 

Higgins praised the Irish priest for his “wonderful courageous work in the most terrible of times.”

“It took great courage and took great commitment and it was morally so striking that somebody did all of that for those threatened,” the Irish president told EWTN. 

The wreath-laying ceremony on Oct. 19, 2023, marked the 60th anniversary of O’Flaherty’s death on Oct. 30, 1963. Credit: Patrick Leonard/EWTN
The wreath-laying ceremony on Oct. 19, 2023, marked the 60th anniversary of O’Flaherty’s death on Oct. 30, 1963. Credit: Patrick Leonard/EWTN

Born in County Cork in 1898, O’Flaherty grew up in Killarney playing golf on the course where his father worked as a steward before discerning his vocation to the priesthood.

As a seminarian, O’Flaherty studied theology in Rome at the Urban College of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith and went on to earn doctorates in both canon law and philosophy in Rome.

He was ordained to the priesthood in 1925 and became a Vatican diplomat, during which time he served in posts in Haiti, Egypt, and Czechoslovakia.

During World War II, O’Flaherty lived in the German College inside Vatican City State and worked at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, then known as the Holy Office. 

The Holy See assigned O’Flaherty the task of visiting the Italian prisoner-of-war camps, where he brought books, cigarettes, chocolate, and hope to the English-speaking Allied prisoners, according to the Hugh O’Flaherty Memorial Society. After these visits, the priest used Vatican Radio to contact the prisoners’ relatives.

When the Nazis occupied Rome for nine months following the fall of Mussolini, O’Flaherty created what came to be known as the “Rome Escape Line” — a network of priests, diplomats, and expatriates in Rome who helped to hide more than 6,000 escaped Allied POWs and Jews in convents, monasteries, and residences.

Among those, O’Flaherty hid 50 people in his Vatican residence, the Pontifical Teutonic College, during the war years. 

Secret meetings among members of the Rome Escape Line to exchange documents and information on safe houses took place inside St. Peter’s Basilica at the foot of Michaelangelo’s Pieta or near the Altar of the Chair, according to the Vatican.

After the liberation in Rome in 1944, the head of the German SS Herbert Kappler was sentenced in 1948 to life imprisonment in solitary confinement in Italy. O’Flaherty went to the prison to visit Kappler — who had previously threatened to torture and kill the Irish priest — every month for 10 years.

In 1959, O’Flaherty baptized Kappler and received the converted war criminal into the Catholic Church.

During his time in Rome, the Irish president also met with Pope Francis and Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin on Oct. 19, 2023, with whom he discussed issues of common interest, including “food security in developing countries and commitment to the elimination of poverty,” according to the Vatican. Credit: Vatican Media
During his time in Rome, the Irish president also met with Pope Francis and Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin on Oct. 19, 2023, with whom he discussed issues of common interest, including “food security in developing countries and commitment to the elimination of poverty,” according to the Vatican. Credit: Vatican Media

With the opening of Vatican archives from the pontificate of Pius XII (1939–1958), historians have been further researching O’Flaherty’s life and legacy. 

“In his native Kerry they are very very proud of this wonderful man that they produced at the heart of the Vatican who was able to do so much,” Higgins told EWTN.

“It is very appropriate that he be remembered and honored, and also that his example be repeated.”

[…]

2 Trackbacks / Pingbacks

  1. Prosecution calls witnesses as Vatican finance trial resumes | Passionists Missionaries Kenya, Vice Province of St. Charles Lwanga, Fathers & Brothers
  2. Prosecution calls witnesses as Vatican finance trial resumes | Franciscan Sisters of St Joseph (FSJ) , Asumbi Sisters Kenya

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

All comments posted at Catholic World Report are moderated. While vigorous debate is welcome and encouraged, please note that in the interest of maintaining a civilized and helpful level of discussion, comments containing obscene language or personal attacks—or those that are deemed by the editors to be needlessly combative or inflammatory—will not be published. Thank you.


*