A Vatican court docket has convicted Italian Cardinal Angelo Becciu, 75, of a number of counts of embezzlement and sentenced him to 5 years and 6 months in jail. Cardinal together with 9 different defendants awaited verdict within the historic Vatican fraud trial case on Saturday. Together with embezzlement, cardinal was charged with abuse of workplace and making an attempt to induce a witness to offer false testimony.
The trial had uncovered infighting and people of excessive energy concerned in corruption within the Vatican. Becciu was one of many highly effective figures within the Vatican, who held the place of “sostituto” (substitute) within the Holy See’s Secretariat of State. The place got here with immense privileges together with walk-in visits and conferences with the Pope.
The panel of three lay judges of the Vatican’s legal court docket retired at 11.30 am (Rome time) to contemplate its verdicts on Saturday. Studying a notice of because of legal professionals and the media, Court docket President Giuseppe Pignatone termed the trial as “notably advanced”.
Extra particulars of the decision is but to identified.
The trial revolved across the buy of a constructing in London by the Secretariat of State, the Vatican’s key administrative and diplomatic division. In 2014, Becciu held the quantity two place within the workplace when it started investing in a fund managed by Italian financier Raffaele Mincione, securing about 45% of the constructing at 60 Sloane Avenue, in an upmarket district of the capital, reported Reuters.
In 2016, Becciu had moved to a different Vatican publish, the Secretariat of State felt it was being deceived by Mincione and turned to a different financier, Gianluigi Torzi, for assist in squeezing Mincione out and shopping for the remainder of the constructing.
Torzi had obtained an excessive amount of cash within the course of as properly and he was charged with fraud, and corruption too.
In the meantime, the Vatican offered the constructing final 12 months, taking an estimated lack of about 140 million euros.
Becciu was fired by Pope Francis in 2020 for alleged nepotism. Amongst different accusations in opposition to the cardinal embody funnelling cash and contracts to firms or charitable organisations managed by his brothers on their native island of Sardinia.
Reportedly, Becciu was additionally accused of hiring a self-styled safety analyst to assist a nun escape, who had been kidnapped in Mali.
Analyst Cecilia Marogna additionally acquired cash from the Secretariat of State in 2018-2019. In accordance with the prosecutors, the cash was despatched to an organization she had arrange in Slovenia and she or he acquired some in money.
Italian police mentioned Marogna had spent a lot of the cash for private use, together with luxurious model clothes and visits to well being spas. She is charged with embezzlement.
The opposite six defendants embody the previous president and director of the Vatican’s Monetary Intelligence unit, the cardinal’s former secretary, Father Mauro Carlino, and three former Vatican staff. 4 firms related to particular person defendants had been additionally indicted.
