Vatican Tribunal publishes reasons for judgement in London building trial

By Vatican News

An intricate investigation that has seen the intertwining of several areas of examination and a complex trial with 86 hearings could not but conclude with an equally complex sentence - filed on the 29th of October - which upholds the decisions of the Tribunal headed by Giuseppe Pignatone.

In December 2023 the Tribunal convicted almost all the defendants of some crimes, while acquitting them of others: Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu and Raffaele Mincione were found guilty of embezzlement; Enrico Crasso of the crime of self-laundering; Gianluigi Torzi and Nicola Squillace of aggravated fraud and Torzi also of extortion in addition to Fabrizio Tirabassi; Tirabassi himself for self-laundering. Becciu and Cecilia Marogna were found guilty of aggravated fraud.

Guarantees for the accused

The judgment first of all highlights the many legislative innovations introduced in Vatican legislation since 2010 to adapt “to international models and best practices”, aimed at greater internal transparency; to prevent “crimes being committed with impunity” by those working for the State and the Holy See.

The Tribunal then responds point by point to the accusations of a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, explaining that “the Vatican legal system recognises the principle of due process, the principle of the presumption of innocence and the right of defence, which are indeed expressly provided for by the current rules.” The judgement says, “with the conviction that cross-examination between the parties is the best method to achieve procedural truth and also, as far as possible, to try to arrive at the truth without embellishments, the Tribunal has always sought, making the most of the areas left to the interpreter by the legal framework in force, to adopt interpretations and operational practices that would guarantee the effectiveness of cross-examination, ensuring the widest room for the parties, and in particular for the Defence.”

The Tribunal also explains the legitimacy of the Promoter of Justice's decision not to deposit all the WhatsApp messages at its disposal because they were connected to other hypotheses of offenses and areas of investigation.

Clarification on embezzlement and the role of Perlasca

Another significant passage clarifies the nature of the crime of embezzlement, which exists even if the defendant did not put money in his own pocket: Italy’s Court of Cassation itself identifies this in the case in which the public administrator “instead of investing for the purposes for which the financial resources the person has at his or her disposal were intended, the person in violation of the law and the regulations uses them to purchase shares in speculative funds.” Therefore, the crime remains even given the fact that there was no personal and direct interest on the part of the one who authorised the gamble of investing a massive sum of money in a highly speculative fund.

The Tribunal also termed Monsignor Alberto Perlasca as unreliable, calling his statements “devoid of independent probative relevance for the purposes of this trial”, and basing its decision “solely and exclusively on those facts that have reached the dignity of proof.”

The 200 million investment with Mincione

A large part of the sentence meticulously reconstructs the underwriting of the Falcon Oil operation and the subscription by the Secretariat of State of shares in the Athena Capital Commodities Fund and Global Opportunities Fund (GOF), referenced to Raffaele Mincione with the payment of 200 million dollars (equal to about one third of the funds available to the Secretariat of State), for which Mincione himself, Cardinal Becciu, Crasso and Tirabassi were convicted for embezzlement. The offence was confirmed because it emerged that there was “a willingness to use the assets in conflict with the interests” of the Holy See.

“It cannot be denied,” reads the grounds for the sentence, “that the illegal use of Church property resulted in an obvious and significant benefit for Mincione and his associates as a direct consequence of the illegal conduct” of Cardinal Becciu, “so it is of no importance that he did not intend to act for profit, nor that he did not gain any benefit from it.”

In fact, the regulations in force require “prudent management aimed first and foremost at the preservation of assets, even when seeking to increase them, by evaluating the opportunities for gain even if they are measured against a possible and in any case limited possibility of loss.” It was therefore necessary to take into account the amount of risk, the amount of the assets invested and the possibility of maintaining some degree of control over management as well as the costs of the operation.

“In the light of these parameters,” the investment in the fund managed by Raffaele Mincione “certainly constitutes an ‘illicit use’ of those ecclesiastical public assets of which the then Substitute Cardinal Becciu had the availability given his office and of which he was well aware of the nature and, consequently, the related legal limits of use.”

The role of Cardinal Becciu, Substitute

The Tribunal’s judgment emphasized that the “General Partner” Mincione made “no commitment and gave no guarantee either as to the return on the investment or as to the risk of loss of the entire capital invested” and “the investor, Secretariat of State, had no power of control.” Moreover, the Tribunal maintains that it is not at all true that this reckless use of the Holy See's money was endorsed by the two successive Cardinal Secretaries of State (Tarcisio Bertone and Pietro Parolin).

Cardinal Becciu, the sentence reads, acknowledged “that it was he who proposed the Angola Operation to the Office on the basis of his previous acquaintance and friendship with the businessman Mosquito,” the operation that later turned into the investment in Mincione's fund. Becciu was very interested in the operation and personally involved, so much so that he made direct contact with Crasso, something that had never happened before. The Cardinal himself acknowledged that “there had never before been the entrusting of such a large amount to a single person.”

The judgement also noted that “it certainly could not have escaped a person with the experience and skills of the then Substitute Becciu” who Mincione was, either from press information or from information gathered by the Vatican Gendarmerie, which had advised against doing business with him. “It remains then inexplicable that none of the public officials involved in this serious affair had at least attempted, once the Falcon Oil operation was definitively closed, to close the relationship with Mincione by 'exiting’ the GOF Fund.”

 The position of Mincione

“Raffaele Mincione,” the Tribunal stated, “contributed decisively through his conduct to committing the crime of embezzlement in question of which he was, moreover, the major beneficiary.” The financier knew that he had been entrusted with money from the Holy See and had always spoken directly with the Secretariat of State and therefore must have known very well that he would have to answer for it “according to the rules of Vatican law.”

Moreover, “it is difficult to understand why Raffaele Mincione, who - as a prudent entrepreneur - was assisted by teams of professionals of the highest level in all the areas involved in the Falcon Oil - GOF operation, and in particular by law firms with particular expertise in English law, in Luxembourg law, and in European Union law, did not consider it necessary to do the same for the Vatican system that he knew well regulates the activity of the Entity (Secretariat of State) that paid him such huge sums.” Alleged ignorance of the rules in force at the Vatican is therefore no excuse.

Torzi and the purchase of the London building

The other major area addressed in the ruling is the second phase of the London transaction in November 2018 that involved the transfer by Torzi to the Secretariat of State of 30,000 shares (out of 31,000) of GUTT, i.e. the company that had acquired control and, indirectly, ownership of the 60 Sloane Avenue Building. The 1,000 shares remaining to Torzi were, however, the only ones with voting rights and therefore, the Secretariat of State, despite the sale of the GOF shares and the disbursement of £40 million, had not acquired control of the building at all, which essentially passed from Raffaele Mincione to Gianluigi Torzi.

After a detailed reconstruction of the events and the concrete role played by each of the defendants, the Tribunal found Gianluigi Torzi and Nicola Squillace guilty of the crime of aggravated fraud. It is shown how the new Substitute, Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, who had immediately expressed doubts about the operation, was deceived and his ratification of the agreements made by Perlasca and Tirabassi occurred because he was deceived by the reassurances received from the lawyer Squillace.

The latter, moreover, “also acted as legal counsel for the Secretariat of State itself,” convincing “the top management of the Dicastery that with the London Agreements the objectives they had set for themselves had been achieved, namely that the Secretariat of State was the sole economic beneficiary of GUTT and that, through GUTT, it had substantial control of the property” - which was not true at all.

This aggravated fraud is also linked to the crime of extortion, which the Tribunal confirms by citing “well-established jurisprudence of the Italian Court of Cassation with reference to a concept known in legal jargon as 'cavallo di ritorno' which occurs when property taken from its rightful owner is offered back to the owner with a request for money before it will be returned.” It was this situation, “unlawful at the start, that forced the Secretariat of State” to pay Torzi “a fee that was not owed that constitutes an unjust profit.”

The Tribunal also convicted Fabrizio Tirabassi of the crime of extortion, finding that he had made decisive actions favouring Torzi so he could achieve his goal.

The money to Marogna

Another significant area concerns the 600,000 euro given to Cecilia Marogna at Becciu's behest and on Becciu's instructions. The purpose was to facilitate the release of a Colombian nun kidnapped in Mali, but the money from the Secretariat of State was instead spent by Marogna on hotels, clothing and furniture, and luxury goods.

The ruling examines the affair and divides it into two distinct phases: in the first, Becciu and Marogna turned to a British agency, Inkerman, specialising in kidnapping and abduction cases “to which the total sum of €575,000 was paid by the Secretariat of State in two instalments between February and April 2018. In a second phase, from December 2018 to April 2019, a sum of the same amount was paid instead by means of nine wire transfers to a Slovenian company,” LOGSIC, “set up ad hoc on the day immediately preceding the first payment, belonging to and in the exclusive possession of Cecilia Marogna. Moreover, Becciu had also handed over to Marogna in September 2019 smaller sums in cash (approximately EUR 14,000).”

In brief, while the first payments to Inkerman “were actually intended for a person appointed to carry out activities of a humanitarian nature,” the additional amount of approximately EUR 600,000 paid to Marogna “was found to have no connection whatsoever with the aforementioned purposes,” so much so that Cardinal Becciu never mentioned Marogna's name to his superiors.

The sentence reconstructs in detail the Cardinal's attempt to obtain a letter from the Pope exonerating him, and also the clamorous episode of the telephone call with the Pope as soon as he left the hospital where he had undergone surgery, which Becciu and Maria Luisa Zambrano recorded, and then shared the recording with others.

From the messages that later ended up in an inquiry by the Italian judiciary, it emerges that the Cardinal continued “to have completely cordial relations, if not of real familiarity,” even to meet Marogna after he had “matured a full and definitive awareness of the completely illegitimate manner” in which she had used the sums paid by the Secretariat of State to Logsic (defined in the sentence as a ‘shell company’ that ‘does not exist’). It transpires from the messages that Marogna also had “more than cordial relations with other relatives of the defendant.” And it is pointed out that Becciu did not file a complaint, report or exposé against Marogna, despite knowing how she had used money from the Holy See.

The brother's cooperative

Finally, the judgement examines the chapter of the funds given by the Secretariat of State to the cooperative of Becciu's brother, Antonino, confirming that it was embezzlement not because the money was used for purposes other than charitable ones or was unduly pocketed by someone, but simply because both Article 176 of the Vatican's penal code, and Canon 1298 in the canonical sphere state that “unless it is a matter of the lowest importance, ecclesiastical property must not be sold or leased to its administrators or to their relatives up to the fourth degree of consanguinity or affinity without a special permission given in writing by the competent authority.” And the payment made by the Secretariat of State with Becciu as Substitute to the cooperative administered by his relatives took place “without any written authorization” from the competent authority.