Vatican, the monstrous picture of the London financial scandal
Vatican, the Secretariat of State seeks damages from Becciu and the other defendants. Maria Antonietta Calabrò's post on the JustOut blog
Upon resumption after the summer break of the trial for the largest recent financial scandal involving Vatican finances (that which concerns the famous London building , on Sloane Ave, which sees 10 defendants on trial, starting with Cardinal Angelo Becciu), the parties civilians are outlining the "monstrous" picture (from the Latin monstrum ) of economic damage, of which Pope Francis himself was the first victim, to whom hundreds of millions of euros must be returned.
THE SENTENCES REQUESTED BY THE PROMOTER OF JUSTICE
The Promoter of Justice Alessandro Diddi, in July, requested sentences of 73 years in prison and 387 million euros in confiscations. The civil party IOR (represented by the lawyer Roberto Lipari) asked the Vatican Tribunal chaired by Giuseppe Pignatone "to condemn the defendants and establish their criminal responsibilities" and their "sentence to the restitution of what was illicitly stolen". “The person offended by the conduct of the accused is first and foremost the Holy Father”, as the destination of the 700 million euros disbursed annually starting from 2004 by the Institute for Works of Religion (coming from operating profits and in some cases from the reserves) in favor of the Holy Father and set aside at the Secretariat of State.
THE QUESTION OF ST. PETER'S PENCE
Lipari has demonstrated two things. First of all, much of the damage caused did not concern the so-called Peter's Pence. Of the Obolo, "only" 80 million were used (for Raffaele Mincione's speculative investments) between August and December 2013. “The other 320 million – he said – come from the so-called asset, that is, the treasure” of the Secretariat of State, that is, the assets of the Secretariat of State, which was created thanks to the payments from the IOR in favor of the Pope, it is this asset that in for the most part it was affected by the speculative investments made by Cardinal Becciu and the other defendants".
POPE FRANCIS AND CARDINAL BECCIU
These investments – he further said – are prohibited by the code of canon law and by the provisions dictated already in 1982 (the year of the Ambrosiano scandal) by John Paul II. With guidelines reiterated by Benedict XVI.
The second circumstance demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt is that "no authorization was given by the Pope to Becciu". There is no "written authorization" from the Pope in the trial documents, nor was the defense able to produce them, the only one necessary to proceed with disposing of sums intended for him.
THE SUMS DISTRACTED WERE DESTINED FOR THE POPE
Those diverted were sums intended for the Holy Father – the lawyer Lipari denounced in his conclusions -, therefore it is necessary to return the funds to the bond they had and put them back in the full availability of the Pontiff for the needs of the Church”. “These funds be deposited with the IOR,” the lawyer further requested. And in fact they will be since, thanks to a reform last year wanted by Francis, only the IOR is authorized to make investments for the Vatican: no more financiers, brokers, foreign banks of dubious reputation (Credit Suisse and Banca della Italian Switzerland, involved in the London affair, were both closed).
“In this process we have seen attempts at personal enrichment, oil extraction projects in Angola, we have seen the use of financial instruments in which the administrator of ecclesiastical assets lost any possibility of control and the use of Church money”.
THE DAMAGE TO THE IOR AND BEYOND
As regards the damage suffered by the IOR itself, the lawyer also requested the equitable settlement of the moral damage (multiple) and the reputational damage, the latter estimated by an expert opinion at 987,494 euros.
Enormous reputational damages to be restored by the defendants are instead described in the technical consultancy report drawn up by Professor Giuseppe Guizzi and Sergio Paris on 13 May 2023 "in the interest of the civil party Secretariat of State" represented in court by Professor Paola Severino. According to a median estimate, 138.145 million euros will be needed to restore the reputation of the secretariat of state. The damage was caused by 50 thousand print, web and audio video content, released between 1 October 2019 and 13 April 2023, all centered on the London scandal.
All things considered, the damage to London is proving to be at least equal to that caused to the Vatican by the Ambrosiano scandal for which the Holy See paid a "voluntary contribution" of 250 million dollars, which according to what was recently stated by the late Cardinal George Pell , in reality it would have been a whopping $486 million.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/scandalo-londra-vaticano/ on Fri, 29 Sep 2023 05:50:22 +0000.