Verdicts are expected Saturday for a cardinal and nine other defendants in the most complicated financial trial in the Vatican’s modern history: a case featuring a Hollywood-worthy cast of characters, unseemly revelations about the Holy See and questions about Pope Francis’s own role in the deals.
After 2½ years of hearings, here’s a brief snapshot of the trial and its colourful and often controversial cast of characters:
What was the trial about?
After a two-year investigation that featured unprecedented police raids in the Apostolic Palace, Vatican prosecutors in 2021 issued a 487-page indictment accusing 10 people of numerous financial crimes, including fraud, embezzlement, extortion, corruption, money laundering and abuse of office.
Chief prosecutor Alessandro Diddi is seeking prison sentences from three to 13 years for each of the 10 defendants, as well as the confiscation of some 415 million euros ($606.35 million Cdn) in damages and restitution.
The main focus involved the Holy See’s investment in a luxury London property. Prosecutors allege brokers and Vatican monsignors fleeced the Holy See of tens of millions of euros in fees and commissions, and then extorted the Holy See for 15 million euros ($21.9 million Cdn) to cede control of the property.
The Vatican sold the building last year, taking an estimated loss of about 140 million euros ($204.5 million Cdn).
The star defendant: Cardinal Angelo Becciu
Becciu, once one of Francis’s top advisers and a one-time papal contender, wasn’t originally under investigation in the London deal since he had been transferred from the Vatican secretariat of state to an unrelated office before the key transactions occurred.
But he became enmeshed after prosecutors began looking into other deals, including 125,000 euros ($182,600 Cdn) in Vatican money that he sent to a diocesan charity in his native Sardinia, Italy. Prosecutors alleged embezzlement, since the charity was run by his brother. Becciu argued that the local bishop requested the money for a bakery to employ at-risk youths, and that the money remained in the diocesan coffers.
Becciu is also accused of paying a Sardinian woman, Cecilia Marogna, for her intelligence services. Prosecutors traced some 575,000 euros ($840,900 Cdn) in transfers from the Vatican to her Slovenian front company. Becciu said he thought the money was going to be used to pay a British security firm to negotiate the release of a Colombian nun who had been taken hostage by Islamic militants in Mali in 2017 and was released in 2021.
Marogna, who is also on trial, denied wrongdoing.
The monsignor and the woman who coached him
A key prosecution witness was Monsignor Alberto Perlasca, who ran the office that managed the Vatican’s sovereign wealth fund, with estimated assets of 600 million euros (around $875 million Cdn).
It was Perlasca who signed the contracts in late 2018 giving operative control of the London property to London broker Gianluigi Torzi, another defendant who is accused of then extorting the Vatican for 15 million euros ($21.9 million Cdn) to get the property back.
Because of his intimate involvement in the deal, Perlasca was initially a prime suspect. But after his first round of questioning, he fired his lawyer, changed his story and began co-operating with prosecutors.
But Perlasca could be in trouble again after it emerged that public relations specialist Francesca Chaouqui coached him to change testimony.
Chaouqui, once convicted of conspiring to leak confidential Vatican documents to journalists and received a 10-month suspended sentence, openly nurtured a grudge against Becciu because she blamed him for supporting her prosecution.
It emerged in late 2022, when Perlasca was being questioned on the stand, that Chaouqui had engaged in an elaborate plot with a Perlasca family friend to persuade the prelate to turn on Becciu.
“I knew that sooner or later the moment would come and I would send you this message,” Chaouqui wrote Perlasca in a text message that was entered into evidence. “Because the Lord doesn’t allow the good to be humiliated without repair. I pardon you Perlasca, but remember, you owe me a favour.”
What did Francis know?
Witnesses testified that Francis was very much aware of key aspects of the deals in question, and in some cases explicitly authorized them:
- The former head of the financial intelligence agency who is on trial said Francis explicitly asked him to help the secretariat of state negotiate the exit deal with Torzi;
- Becciu testified Francis had approved spending up to one million euros to negotiate the nun’s freedom;
- Becciu’s one-time secretary, who is on trial, said Francis was so pleased with the outcome of the Torzi negotiation that he paid for a celebratory group dinner at a fancy Roman fish restaurant.
Defence lawyers discovered that the Pope had secretly issued four decrees during the investigation to benefit prosecutors, allowing them to conduct intercepts and detain suspects without a judge’s warrant. The lawyers cried foul, arguing such interference violated their clients’ fundamental rights and robbed them of a fair trial.
Defence lawyers at trial often argued their underling clients merely obeyed orders from the Pope on down.
A three-judge panel will deliver their verdicts Saturday.