Archbishop Peña Parra gives testimony at British High Court

By Salvatore Cernuzio, London

The two-and-a-half hour interrogation in English at the High Court of Justice in London of Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, Substitute of the Secretariat of State, highlighted details regarding the situation into which broker Gianluigi Torzi, convicted in first instance by a Vatican Court also for extortion, involved him and the Secretariat of State with the sale of the London building. Archbishop Peña Parra spoke about the "lies and deception" up until the end, feeling "trapped" and being "forced" to accept Gianluigi Torzi's demands in ending all relations with him. He explained how the broker, arrested in 2020 in the Vatican and soon to be released, was paid two invoices of £5 million and £10 million in the name of his companies Sunset Enterprise and Lighthouse to exit the deal and cede total control to the Holy See of the London building it owned. "I felt totally mocked," said Archbishop Peña Parra in the only words spoken in Italian.

Court interrogation

The Sloane Avenue affair and all events related to it that took place from 2018 onwards (the year of the Venezuelan Archbishop's arrival to the Secretariat of State), occupied the entire hearing the afternoon of 4 July of the judicial proceedings that took place in Courtroom 19 of the High Court's commercial section. The small courtroom had several wooden desks with many computers surrounded by file folders and boxes full of documents.

The current trial began on 24 June following a civil suit filed four years ago by financier Raffaele Mincione. No reference, however, was made by his lawyer Charles Samek during his numerous questions to the Substitute regarding the transactions between Mincione and the Secretariat of State, the subject of the trial in London. The only focus regarded relations with Gianlugi Torzi with the lawyer even going so far as to quote parts of the interrogation given by Archbishop Peña Parra in Rome to the broker's defenders.

"The memo"

The Archbishop was questioned from 2.00 p.m. until 4.30 p.m. and assisted by an interpreter. He gave an account of the work he had done in the matter which, the Holy See's lawyers wrote in the defence brief, revealed a "sad history of corruption" on the part of internal and external figures. He swore an oath on the Gospel and, from a bench beside Judge Robin Knowles, submitted to Samek's line of questions starting with the "memo", i.e. the approximately 300-page brief filed in the Vatican trial file by the Archbishop on 2 June 2020. The lawyer asked the Substitute whether it was drafted himself or if he was helped by others. "This is an informative memo," the prelate explained, "prepared later in 2020 because at that time the Holy Father asked me to present a document or a report on how I found the Secretariat of State after my arrival." The "memo" was produced with the help of the Administrative Office of which Monsignor Alberto Perlasca was no longer in charge. The Office provided the Substitute with documents and information useful for the memo addressed to the Pope. Also assisting, Archbishop Peña Parra added, was a consultant, Luciano Capaldo, for parts relating to the 60 Sloane Avenue Building.

Information given to the Pope

In fact, noted lawyer Charles Samek, in one part of the memo the Substitute stated that he wished to facilitate understanding of "a complex and multi-faceted deal" that had involved "a high level of financial, corporate and technical real estate knowledge." The lawyer suggested the hypothesis that the document in question actually served to inform the Pope of the transactions that had taken place in the London sale, while only partial information would have come from the Substitute.

Three times Archbishop Peña Parra repeated that this document came as the result of a request from the Pope and claimed that "my work at the Secretariat of State does not only concern the Administrative Office and things like that, I took time off to prepare that memo that was addressed to the Holy Father." "Excuse me, sir, can you tell me what are the things I did not do with the Holy Father?" the Substituted added. "I see the Holy Father every Tuesday... The information, I repeat, was a note only to explain to the Holy Father what happened in the Secretariat of State."

Invoices to Torzi

Charles Samek recalled that this note had also been sent to the Office of the Promoter of Justice. Both in this case and in the previous one, according to him, relevant information had been omitted. "Why in this document prepared in full transparency did you not mention the false invoice to Torzi that you had sent to Credit Suisse?" he asked. The reference is to the two aforementioned invoices for the transfers of 5 and 10 million pounds sent to Torzi to obtain the sale of the thousand shares with voting rights that gave him real and full control of the building. The operation, that is, which the Vatican judges called "extortion."

They are "false" invoices, said lawyer Charles Samek, who had copies of letters sent to Credit Suisse indicating different motives from the real ones that were opened on the various computers in the courtroom, connected simultaneously. Like the one for 5 million pounds that cited "professional activities" rendered by Torzi to the Secretariat of State for real estate in other cities. "Why?"

The responses

The Substitute responded by reiterating, first of all, that it was a "broad memo" that not only dealt with the details of the London affair. Of which, he recalled, it emerged in the Vatican proceedings that Archbishop Peña Parra had already informed the Pope in a memo in May 2019 at the conclusion of the deal.

"I did not lie," the Archbishop stated twice. He added: "The invoice was false, but I insisted, in the purpose of the transaction to put a "final, full and definitive settlement" of all our contractual obligations. That was my thinking." The invoice, however, had a different wording and, Mincione's lawyer said, in all cases the signature of the Substitute.

"Trapped"

Archbishop Peña Parra explained that many "technicalities" were taken care of by the Secretariat of State's Administrative Office. And he returned to explaining how he felt "trapped" by Torzi, who, through these ploys, could have continued to ask the Holy See for money. "How was one supposed to deal with this kind of person? Until the end it was all lies and deception. We were trapped because of the situation."

The interrogation of Archbishop Peña Parra will continue tomorrow, 5 July, in both a morning and an afternoon session.