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Holy See funds trial: new indictment for 4 defendants

2022-01-25T16:15:25.440Z


Two trial sections will be joined in the hearing on February 18 (ANSA) The Vatican Tribunal, at the request of the promoter of justice, today again indicted the four defendants of the trial on the management of the funds of the Secretariat of State, born from the purchase of the London building, for which the documents had been sent back to the same prosecutor's office: I am Msgr. Mauro Carlino, former secretary of card. Angelo Becciu, the financier Raffaele Mincione


The Vatican Tribunal, at the request of the promoter of justice, today again indicted the four defendants of the trial on the management of the funds of the Secretariat of State, born from the purchase of the London building, for which the documents had been sent back to the same prosecutor's office: I am Msgr.

Mauro Carlino, former secretary of card.

Angelo Becciu, the financier Raffaele Mincione, the lawyer.

Nicola Squillace and the Vatican official Fabrizio Tirabassi, for all the alleged crimes.

The portion of the trial with these four defendants will be joined to that with the other six, meanwhile continued, on 18 February.

The new citations signed today by President Giuseppe Pignatone also concern Cardinal Angelo Becciu limited to the accusation of subornation of the accused Msgr. Alberto Perlasca, who thus also falls into the process. For the other accused Tommaso Di Ruzza, former director of the Vatican anti-money laundering authority, however, the dismissal for a hypothesis of embezzlement was decided, while the other charges remain standing.

    Speaking with journalists, the adjunct justice promoter Alessandro Diddi explained that "in recent months, in which the defendants' defenses had asked for more information and the interrogations of those who had not been subjected to it in the preliminary phase, none of the defendants presented themselves to be questioned ".

"However, we conducted the investigations anyway - he added -, depositing seven folders of new investigations".


    At the beginning of today's audience in the multipurpose hall of the Vatican Museums - the sixth -, apologizing for the almost two and a quarter hours of delay, President Pignatone attributed the setback to the fact that just this morning they were deposited by the Office of the promoter of justice the new requests for summons for trial regarding the section of the previously canceled trial.


    Pignatone reported that he had signed the summons decree, not having the power to oppose, setting the hearing on February 18 next, when the section with the four new indicted will be joined to that with the other six who in the meantime continued.

Today the deed is served on the parties, along with several dozen pages of motivation.

In the sixth hearing of the trial at the Vatican Tribunal for the management of the funds of the Secretariat of State, which lasted just over 40 minutes today, the defendants' defenses have again advanced objections of "absolute and radical" nullity of the procedure for the still omitted or incomplete filing of documents by the Office of the Promoter of Justice.

    In particular, the lawyer

Fabio Viglione, defender of Cardinal Angelo Becciu, objected that there is "a very large part of the IT documents" that was not delivered in the requested copies.

In particular, of a total of 255 computer media seized, 239 were not issued in copies, while none of the copies delivered "can be qualified as a forensic copy" and "all copies are made up of more than partial data".



    The lawyer Maria Concetta Marzo, also from the defense of Becciu, explained that today's discussion on this missing filing of documents "motivated the absence of the cardinal, in order not to listen to the contents of the dialogues", in particular with reference to the declarations of the key witness Msgr. Alberto Perlasca. According to the lawyer, in fact, "there are points of evidence dealt with in the interrogations of which not a single word is reported in the documents delivered, and not even an omission".



    The reference is to when, in Perlasca's interrogation on November 23, 2020, "a suspected intimate relationship between Cardinal Becciu and Cecilia Marogna is explored". The promoter of justice is heard asking Perlasca about the relationship between the cardinal and the woman and the answer of the questioned is that he knows nothing, "not even a word". But the magistrate insists: "how does he know nothing? Has Crozza ever heard what he hypothesizes in his broadcasts? The cardinal sued L'Espresso and does nothing in Crozza? I would have massacred him, I would have hurt him," what are you doing, don't you challenge him? ". But Perlasca confines himself to observing that perhaps with the weekly proceeding by legal means "it was easier". "There is not a single word of this test topic in the report", underlined thelawyer March, according to which, however, both the references to the "current rumors" as in the case of Crozza, and the references to the "morality" of the cardinal plead the nullity of the transcription process "because it is flawed".



    "The accused has the right not to ask questions about morality or facts that never happened - underlined, in association, the lawyer Luigi Panella, defender of Enrico Crasso -, under penalty of radical and absolute nullity".



    The adjunct promoter of justice, Alessandro Diddi, explained that he did not know which parts of the documents were missing in the media delivered in copies, materially made by the Judicial Police, and President Pignatone gave him a deadline until January 31 to verify. As for the missing transcripts cited, he added, "we tried to represent everything that was declared, but also not to leave traces that could have damaged the reputation.



    An attempt was made to protect the morality of the assisted person ". The exceptions, therefore, for the accusation" have no basis. "The Court will decide in the hearing scheduled for 18 February next. 


Source: ansa

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