In a series of interviews aired on Belgian television, Becciu discussed Pope Francis' role and his own conviction for fraud and embezzlement.

Becciu, who served as the papal chief of staff until his resignation in 2020, is currently appealing a five-year prison sentence for misusing church funds.

"It will be necessary to clarify the exercise of papal authority" Becciu said. The cardinal insisted that the pope should be removed from the temporal governance of Vatican City. "That is, he should no longer be a head of state."

Convicted Cardinal Becciu

In a historic ruling, the Vatican Criminal Court on Saturday sentenced Becciu, 75, to five and a half years in prison.

This marks the first instance of such a high-ranking church official facing prison time for financial misconduct.

Becciu was found guilty on several charges, including misappropriation related to a significant loss-making investment in a London property.

The court found that Becciu failed to ensure due diligence while overseeing an investment of around $200 million between 2013 and 2014.

This investment represented nearly one-third of the total assets of the Vatican State Secretariat at the time.

Court finds limited fraud charges

Although Becciu was found guilty of misappropriation, he was cleared of other fraud allegations tied to the London deal.

Brokers and financial advisors involved—Enrico Crasso, Raffaele Mincione, Gianluigi Torzi and Nicola Squillace—were handed prison sentences ranging from five and a half to seven and a half years for related charges including fraud and money laundering.

Joint fraud scheme

Cardinal Becciu faced further charges involving 570,000 euros allocated to Cecilia Marogna, allegedly under the guise of humanitarian aid.

The court found they conspired to misuse these funds, resulting in Marogna's sentence of three years and nine months.

"The court recognised that both parties committed serious fraud" the Vatican judge said in the written ruling.

Family ties

The court also determined Becciu transferred 125,000 euros from the Vatican to a charity managed by his brother, Antonio.

While the charitable purpose was deemed legitimate, Becciu breached Vatican penal codes by directing funds to a close family member.

Becciu maintains innocence

During the Belgian TV broadcast, Becciu maintained his innocence, arguing that the pope was misled about his actions.

"I guess someone took revenge on me" Becciu speculated.

He attributed his downfall to jealousy over his close relationship with the pope.

Despite the court's rulings being lighter than the demands of the prosecution, Becciu's defence team announced plans to appeal, challenging the legitimacy of the entire trial process.

Sources

The Pillar

AP News

English Katholisch

CathNews New Zealand

Milone claims his resignation from the role of auditor general was extorted under threat of arrest in 2017, as was a similarly forced resignation of one of his two deputies, Ferruccio Panicco, on the following day. Mr Panicco died from cancer in 2023.

Mr Milone believes he was framed and forced to resign seven years ago to avoid being arrested and sent to jail in the Vatican. He believes that those who wanted to remove him as auditor general deceived Pope Francis regarding his activities to get the Pope to agree to his removal.

Mr Milone, 75, and his lawyers told this to a small group of journalists, including America's Vatican correspondent, at a press briefing in his lawyers' office in Rome on June 19.

Read More

The revelation came during his testimony at the landmark financial misconduct case.

"I did it, and if necessary, I would do it again," the archbishop told a Vatican tribunal in revealing testimony in the landmark financial misconduct case.

The archbishop, who is not a defendant, said he ordered the surveillance to gain information about the "anomalous attitude" of directors of the Institute for Religious Works (IOR) who refused to grant a loan application from the Secretariat of State for a controversial London real estate deal.

Peña Parra also admitted that he "maybe" asked a subordinate to arrange for a wiretap on Mammì's phone, who was then the director of IOR.

Legal repercussions

The surveillance, which occurred inside Vatican City and on Italian territory.

The action could lead to legal repercussions for Archbishop Peña Parra in both jurisdictions.

The Secretariat of State requested the loan from IOR in 2019 to refinance the high-interest mortgage on the London building they had acquired. However, IOR leadership rejected the loan application, leading to pressure from the Secretariat's leadership.

Mammì and the bank's president, Jean Baptiste de Franssu, then took their concerns to Pope Francis, who authorised a criminal investigation into the London deal and the Secretariat of State's finances.

The archbishop's testimony has prompted questions about his future in office.

Peña Parra's predecessor, Cardinal Angelo Becciu, is the star defendant in the current trial.

Becciu stands accused of several financial crimes relating to his tenure in office as sostituto (deputy). However it is Peña Parra who oversaw several controversial aspects of the London property deal that led to the criminal investigation and trial.

Sources

The Pillar

But it does not necessarily mean Becciu's rights as a cardinal, stripped by the pope two years ago, are being restored.

Over the weekend, Becciu made headlines for telling attendees of a small private Mass which he celebrated on Sunday, that he is being "reinstated" by Pope Francis.

According to Italian media outlets, Becciu told congregants at Italy's Golfo Aranci that, "On Saturday, the pope phoned me to tell me that I will be reinstated in my cardinal duties and to ask me to participate in a meeting with all the cardinals that will be held in the coming days in Rome".

Read More

The investigations targeted broker Gianluigi Torzi who, along with four others, is currently on trial in the Vatican.

The group are allegedly involved in packaging bad debt claims to Italian hospitals and selling them as bond securities with a nominal value of one billion euros.

Torzi, who brokered the Vatican's 2018 purchase of a London development project, is facing trial in the Vatican City State on charges of extortion, embezzlement, fraud and money laundering.

The allegations which led to this week's raids bear a striking similarity to Torzi's previous business dealings involving debt securitisation at other Italian hospitals. There are also alleged links to organised crime and the Vatican's London property deal.

Italian authorities had been investigating whether companies owned by Torzi defrauded Rome's Fatebenefratelli Hospital when they helped convert debts owed to the hospital into securities that could be sold at a diminished value to raise cash for hospital operations.

There are conflicting reports in Italian media about how, exactly, Torzi's companies are believed to have defrauded the hospital.

But generally, they are described as having realised large commissions and exorbitant service fees for their work, while allegedly withholding some funds owed to the hospital.

Torzi has maintained his innocence and, in October 2021, the Vatican announced a rescue plan for the hospital.

Torzi became involved with the Vatican in 2018, as the Secretariat of State sought to separate from its investment manager Raffaele Mincione.

Mincione owned the London property in which the Vatican was investing. Torzi was contracted by the secretariat to broker the final part of the Vatican's purchase for a total cost of some 350 million euros.

According to The Pillar (a catholic media project), Torzi's companies had previously lent Mincione 26 million euros against the value of bank shares which had collapsed in value earlier.

Both men have been charged in Vatican City by prosecutors in the current financial trial.

Sources

Pillar

AP News

Neustar, a technology and security company, has been named in pretrial motions filed by John Durham, the special counsel investigating the handling of a 2016 inquiry into alleged Russian interference in the US general election.

The company has also featured in the ongoing Vatican financial scandal and trial, with Cardinal Becciu facing questions over millions of dollars of "classified" payments he authorised to the company.

The cardinal has declined to elaborate on the Secretariat of State's need for classified services from a telecommunications security and intelligence firm.

Read More

"I hope with all my heart that he is innocent. Besides, he was a collaborator of mine and helped me a lot. He is a person whom I have a certain esteem as a person, that is to say that my wish is that he turns out well … In any case, justice will decide," the pope told Carlos Herrera, a journalist at Spain's COPE radio station.

Becciu is one of 10 defendants in the Vatican's largest trial for financial crimes in the modern era, after the pope changed the norms to allow cardinals to be tried by lay judges.

Becciu is accused of embezzlement and abuse of office, but vehemently denies any wrongdoing.

Read More

The indictments are in connection with the Secretariat of State's 350 million-euro investment in a London real estate venture.

The president of the Vatican's criminal tribunal, Giuseppe Pignatone, set July 27 as the trial date, according to a Vatican press statement.

The indictments were handed down following a sprawling, two-year investigation into how the Secretariat of State managed its vast asset portfolio. Much of which is funded by the Peter's Pence donations from the faithful.

The scandal has resulted in a sharp reduction in donations and prompted Pope Francis to strip the office of its ability to manage the money.

Five former Vatican officials, including Cardinal Angelo Becciu and two officials from the Secretariat of State, were indicted, as well as Italian businessmen who handled the London investment.

Read More

Under the pope's plan, the agency will be split into three parts, the Vatican said on Saturday. They are vigilance, rules and legal affairs, and financial information.

The Vatican's Financial Information Authority, known as AIF, will now be called the Supervisory and Financial Information Authority, or ASIF.

This reflects its regulatory function over other Vatican entities and departments.

The overhaul is part of reforms wanted by Francis to ensure "transparency and reinforce controls in the economic-financial sector," the agency's president Carmelo Barbagallo, previously at Italy's central bank, told Vatican media in an interview.

In late November, Francis told reporters aboard a papal flight that AIF had failed in "its duty of control."

Smoking out financial scandal has been a motif of Francis' papacy. One "opaque" investment deal in prime London real estate provoking a raid of the AIF offices in October 2019.

The Vatican suspended five employees after the raid, including the former director of the office, Italian layman Tommaso Di Ruzza.

The president of the anti-money-laundering authority, René Brülhart, resigned following the raids. Brülhart issued a strong defense of Di Ruzza and expressed dismay at his treatment by Vatican officials.

The deal-broker Gianluigi Torzi has been arrested and faces charges of extortion, embezzlement, aggravated fraud and money-laundering in the £160 million deal, which was paid for with money donated by ordinary churchgoers.

The scandal also saw the resignation of ex-cardinal Angelo Becciu. Becciu resigned following allegations he had sent €100,000 in Holy See funds to a charity controlled by his brother.

Shortly after the upheaval, the Egmont Group, a global network of financial intelligence authorities, suspended the AIF.

Beyond countering corruption and the financing of terrorism, ASIF will also be responsible for the "prudential supervision" and regulation of any Vatican office that handles investments or financial transactions. It is also tasked with carrying out financial investigations.

The new Vatican statute states that the new financial watchdog will "have access to documents and data, even of a confidential nature, and exchange information at domestic and international level."

Sources

• Religion News
• Bloomberg
• Morning Star

"I didn't know that there was so much criminality involved," Pell said. He was speaking to the AP before the Dec. 15 release of the first volume of his jailhouse memoir, 'Prison Journal.'

The book chronicles the first five months of the 404 days Pell spent in solitary confinement in a Melbourne lockup.

The cardinal led the Vatican's Secretariat for the Economy from 2014-2017. He left the job in 2017 to face charges in Australia that he sexually molested two 13-year-old choir boys in 1996.

After a first jury deadlocked, a second unanimously convicted him. He was sentenced to six years in prison. The conviction was upheld on appeal only to be thrown out by Australia's High Court. In April 2020, the court found there was reasonable doubt in the testimony of his lone accuser.

In Prison Journey, Pell makes repeated reference to his three years at the Vatican trying to impose international accounting, budgeting and transparency standards on the Holy See's notoriously siloed bureaucracy, where prefects guard their money, turf and power as fiefdoms.

Pell told AP that the rolling series of financial scandals appeared to show criminal behavior.

A full Vatican trial could eventually establish the whole truth. "It just might be staggering incompetence," he said.

Pell said his efforts had been "sadly vindicated by revelations and developments."

"It would be better for the church if these things hadn't happened, if I wasn't vindicated in this way," said Pell. "But given that they have happened, it's quite clear" that his original reforming agenda was necessary.

Pell's reforming efforts met with institutional resistance from some curial officials and departments, most notably Cardinal Angelo Becciu.

At the time of Pell's tenure at the Secretariat for the Economy, Becciu was sostituto of the Vatican's Secretariat of State. Becciu at one point acted to cancel a contract Pell had made for an external audit of Vatican finances.

CNA has also reported that Pell and Becciu repeatedly clashed over financial affairs. This included the use of Swiss banks to provide financing for different investments allegedly obscured from Vatican balance sheets. Amongst them was the controversial purchase of a London building for €350 million, and the millions of euros in donations from the faithful paid to Italian middlemen to manage the deal.

On Sept. 24, Becciu was asked by Pope Francis to resign from his Vatican job and from the rights of cardinals. Media reports suggested that he used Church funds to benefit family members. Other accounts indicated Becciu had used church funds to influence the outcome of Pell's sex abuse trial in Australia.

Becciu has denied the charges.

Pell said of the allegations against Becciu that "I hope for the sake of the Church, there's nothing in it."

Sources

AP News

Crux

Catholic News Agency

The Vatican cardinal was sacked by Pope Francis in September, amid a corruption investigation. He is suing Italian news magazine L'Espresso, claiming that by ruining his reputation his chance of becoming pope was destroyed.

Bacciu's complaint raises questions about the conduct of Vatican criminal prosecutors investigating a corruption case. It suggests they leaked information to L'Espresso about financial irregularities in the Holy See.

Becciu resigned as the prefect of the Vatican's head of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in September after Pope Francis had presented the cardinal with allegations he had sent €100,000 in Holy See funds to a charity controlled by his brother.

Becciu admitted he sent the funds to the charity, not his brother - and told reporters he had done nothing wrong.

To date, he has not been under investigation in that case or any other, Becciu said in a statement announcing the lawsuit's seeking damages.

In his legal complaint, Becciu claimed that his sacking was a coordinated hit job with L'Espresso.

The magazine broke news of the payment to his brother in a story that went to the printers Sept. 24.

The complaint alleges Francis had a copy of the magazine's article on his desk during the Sept. 24 meeting at which he sacked Becciu. This suggested an internal leak of the story to the Vatican.

The L'Espresso's publisher has said some early editions "disappeared" from the printer that night and ended up on the pope's desk.

The complaint also says that nearly eight hours before Becciu's 6 p.m. meeting with Francis, L'Espresso created a webpage with an article entitled "This is why Cardinal Becciu resigned."

Citing the timestamp of the site's metadata, the complaint argues that the magazine knew about Becciu's sacking before he did, suggesting coordination with the Vatican.

L'Espresso has been leading the charge against Becciu. It has published a series of unsourced and speculative articles outlining prosecutors' case against him. Some of them citing unnamed Vatican investigators but others offering no attribution for the magazine's claims.

Sources

• Religion News
• Catholic News Agency

The anti-corruption agency statement contradicts Italian media speculation that the money might be linked to the overturned convictions of Cardinal George Pell for child sex abuse.

Last month, several Italian newspapers reported unsubstantiated claims that Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu was suspected of wiring €700,000 to Australian banks in 2018.

This money was supposedly used to help secure evidence against Cardinal Pell in his sexual abuse trial.

Federal financial crimes regulator AUSTRAC confirmed it had provided information to both the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and Victoria Police.

The AFP said it referred some of the financial intelligence onto Victoria's Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC).

But in a statement on Nov 11, IBAC said there was not enough substance to warrant an investigation.

"IBAC confirms it received information based on media reports which alleged Vatican funds were transferred to individuals in support of the recent case against George Pell," the commission said.

"IBAC has reviewed the information and found the threshold to commence inquiries or an investigation was not met.

"This matter would only be further considered if any additional, credible information is received," the commission said in a statement.

Pell was brought in by Pope Francis to bring accountability and transparency to the Vatican's opaque finances in 2014. Becciu and Pell were known to have clashed over Pell's financial clean-up efforts at the Holy See.

The Italian newspaper speculated that Becciu might have "bought" the testimony of Pell's accuser to get Pell out of the Vatican.

Pell's accuser, who cannot be identified, has denied the allegation.

Becciu was subsequently dismissed over allegations that he wired 100,000 euros in Vatican funds to a charity headed by his brother.

He has denied wrongdoing over those funds and has repeatedly denied involvement in Pell's conviction.

In 2019 Pell was convicted of sexual offences and sentenced to six years imprisonment. The charges were overturned by the High Court of Australia in 2020 and Pell was freed from prison in April.

Sources

ABC News

ABC Net

Becciu, a former top Vatican official was fired last month by Pope Francis, who accused him of embezzlement and nepotism. Becciu has denied all wrongdoing.

Cecilia Marogna (39) was arrested in Milan under an international warrant issued by a Vatican magistrates.

A senior Vatican source says Holy See magistrates suspect Marogna of embezzlement and aggravated misappropriation in complicity with others.

Recent Italian newspaper reports say Becciu used his senior position at the Vatican Secretariat of State to pass hundreds of thousands of euros in Holy See funds to Marogna's Slovenian-based consulting firm, purportedly for humanitarian operations in Africa and Asia.

Marogna is not denying she had received 500,000 euros ($587,350) over a four-year period from Becciu.

Exactly what the money was used for is still being investigated.

In one report Marogna says it was used to run a "parallel diplomacy" to help missionaries in conflict zones.

She says the money was used as compensation, travel reimbursements and consultancy fees as well as some luxury expenditures.

Using her purchases of designer handbags as an example, she says they were purchased "maybe for the wife of a Nigerian friend who was in a position to talk to the president of Burkina Faso."

Marogna's work for the Vatican Secretariat of State was not previously known.

It is not yet known what charges Marogna could face if she was merely on the receiving end of consulting fees approved by Becciu.

He had been given broad discretionary authority to manage the Secretariat of State's assets by his senior at the Secretariat, Cardinal Pietro Parolin.

Becciu's lawyer says his client knew Marogna but his dealings with her had been "exclusively about institutional matters."

The sacked cardinal has also been caught up in another Vatican financial scandal revolving around the use of Church money to invest in a luxury building in London.

Last year, L'Espresso linked the cardinal to a shady investment in high-end London real estate.

The Vatican allegedly paid over US$200 million into the venture — mostly from donations from Catholic faithful. In the meanwhile, middlemen allegedly pocketed tens of millions in fees. Five Vatican employees were subsequently suspended.

Becciu has denied all wrongdoing in the deal and defended the purchase, saying the property has increased in value.

Source

• Reuters
• Business Insider
• NPR
• Image:Stuff

His resignation followed an unscheduled meeting with the pope. Francis told him he had lost his trust and ordered him to step down.

News of Becciu's resignation was followed by reports that Italian businessman Gianluigi Torzi has provided detailed information to investigators in the ongoing Vatican financial scandal.

Torzi was arrested by Vatican investigators in June and charged with "extortion, embezzlement, aggravated fraud and self-laundering,".

After his arrest, he spent three days with Vatican authorities, walking them through details of the case.

Italian authorities are now helping to track several hundred million euros of Vatican funds.

Francis has also appointed an Italian lawyer and professor of commercial law to work as an additional prosecutor in the Vatican City State's court.

The new appointment is fueling expectation that Becciu and several of his former colleagues at the Secretariat of State could face criminal prosecution in Vatican City.

It has also been reported that a brewing company owned by Becciu's brother Mario, received a 1.5 million euro loan.

The loan was provided by Angolan businessman Antonio Mosquito, who has links with the Cardinal and the Secretariat of State.

Cardinal Angelo Becciu served as apostolic nuncio to the African nation from 2001-2009.

In 2012, having moved to Rome as sostituto of the Secretariat of State, he was involved in the secretariat's consideration of a reported $200 million investment in Mosquito's company Falcon Oil. He served in that role for nearly 10 years.

He was made a cardinal and placed in charge of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in 2018.

After vetting the deal for a year, the secretariat decided instead to invest the money with Italian businessman Raffaele Mincione.

That decision led to the controversial purchase of a London building - and which kicked off the current investigation.

Becciu says the money was intended to help children with autism.

The following morning, a story accusing Becciu of using his positions in the curia to funnel money to members of his own family was published.

Becciu's resignation followed more than a year of reporting about various financial scandals involving Becciu and the Holy See's Secretariat of State.

Many of these reports stemmed from the Secretariat's investments through Italian businessman Raffaele Mincione, an associate of Torzi's, including the purchase from him of the London property for hundreds of millions of dollars.

Italian police served a search and seizure warrant on Mincione in July, issued at the request of Vatican prosecutors.

Investigators took away cell phones and tablets for examination in relation to the case.

Mincione has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.

Lawyers for the Becciu family have lodged official complaints for the "slander and aggravated defamation" of their clients and for "illegal leakage of confidential information and documents" to media.

Since October 2019, investigators in Vatican City have raided several Vatican departments in connection with the London property deal and investments.

Computers and phones were seized and several staff members were suspended.

Source

• Catholic News Agency
• Image: MSN.com

The Secretariat of State is the most powerful department in the Vatican bureaucracy. The Financial Information Authority, or AIF, was created in 2010 by then-Pope Benedict XVI to combat money laundering after the Vatileaks banking scandal.

The communique stated that Vatican police "acquired documents and electronic devices" in the raid, presumably having to do with the secretariat's financial dealings, in the wake of charges presented last summer by the Institute for Religious Works, commonly known as the Vatican bank, and the office of the Revisor General, which is responsible for investigating corruption.

The Vatican has never publicly mentioned the charges, however, and last week's brief statement didn't explain the reason for the raid. Requests for clarification to the Vatican Press Office went unanswered.

The raid seems to be the latest shoe to drop in the Catholic Church's ongoing attempt to reform the Vatican's financial arm, an effort that has suffered setbacks of late. The three departments Pope Francis created to champion the reform, the Secretariat for the Economy, the office of the Auditor General and the Council for the Economy, have been decapitated or have shown themselves to be ineffective.

In 2014, Francis named Australian Cardinal George Pell prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, who set about cleaning up the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See, the financial center at the Vatican. But a year later, Pell became embroiled in charges of sexual abuse of two choristers in Australia; he is currently serving a six-year prison sentence. No substitute has been appointed by Francis to take his place.

Libero Milone, selected by Francis to be the first auditor general, was unceremoniously kicked out of the Vatican in 2017 by the gendarmerie before he was able to finish his work for alleged double-dipping on expenses amounting to $33,000. All charges against him have since been dropped, and Milone, who had accused a former papal chief of staff, now Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu, of financial malfeasance, has said his ouster was politically motivated.

Meanwhile, little has been heard from the Council for the Economy, as its head, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, grapples with tensions with the bishops in his native Germany. On Sept. 20, the council had an extraordinary meeting with representatives from various Vatican departments, allegedly for the purpose of reining in the Vatican budget deficit of over $76 million, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Francis hasn't given up. Last week, two days after the raid, he named a former lawyer for the city of Rome, Giuseppe Pignatone, as president of the Vatican tribunal.

Pignatone is well known for his commitment to fighting syndicated crime in the Italian capital, a choice that has led some local media to suspect that the financial scandal has taken a complex turn.

If last week's one-paragraph explanation of the raid only seemed to invite speculation, the Roman media's rumor machine was happy to oblige. Journalists clamored to reach their sources and paced the halls seeking clerics and laypeople to explain this new Vatican riddle.

Italian daily "L'Espresso" got there first. On Wednesday, the paper published an image of a document issued by the head of the Vatican police, Domenico Giani, showing pictures of five people, four lay and one religious, all of whom were said to be "cautiously suspended from service." It is unclear why the Vatican did not share the document with the press, as it was handed out widely to Vatican employees.

In the Oct. 3 article, L'Espresso's Vatican reporter, Emiliano Fittipaldi, explained that the current scandal revolves around investments made by Becciu and Monsignor Alberto Perlasca, who oversaw the secretariat's financial investments until he was abruptly removed by Francis this summer.

Starting in 2011, according to Fittipaldi, the two prelates made investments with two Luxembourg-based companies using money that may have been derived from donations by the faithful. The investments are said to concern a real estate property in London.

Perlasca's name appears in the document published in L'Espresso, as does that of Monsignor Mauro Carlino, who oversees the Office of Information and Documentation of the Vatican Secretariat of State. His position was previously held by Carlo Maria Polvani, nephew of the papal accuser and former Vatican representative to the United States, Carlo Maria Viganò.

Also named were Tommaso Di Ruzza, second in command to Financial Information Authority President René Brülhart, Vincenzo Mauriello, of the Secretariat of State's protocol department, and Fabrizio Tirabassi, who oversaw the Secretariat of State's financial investments after Perlasca's departure.

Finally, there was Caterina Sansone, an administrative assistant at the Secretariat of State who answered to Tirabassi.
All of them are barred from entering the Vatican, with the exception of Carlino, who resides in the Domus Sanctae Martae, a hotel that is also the pope's current residence.

But what these people are accused of — if anything — is still unknown, and speculation in the Italian press has shed no light on how any alleged misdeeds are related to their higher ups, if at all. One story this week had Becciu being told by Francis that he is no longer allowed to leave the Vatican.

"How funny!" the veteran cardinal tweeted in answer. "Just yesterday the pope wished me safe travels for the flight that tomorrow will take me to Brazil!"

• Claire Giangravé in RNS