Vatican to work with Italian authorities to prosecute source of leaks

Vatican City, Sep 19, 2024 / 11:36 AM

The Vatican is cooperating with Italian prosecutors in an investigation into the leak of financial information related to the Vatican’s major financial trial that concluded last year.

Italian media report that an investigation is underway into two men who gained unauthorized access hundreds of times to a database of suspicious financial activities shared by banks with Italy. This may also have involved confidential information about Italian politicians and suspects in the Vatican trial.

The database is used by prosecutors and judges dealing with mafia crimes in money laundering and terrorist financing cases.

In a brief note to journalists from the Holy See press office on Tuesday, it was reported that Vatican prosecutor Alessandro Diddi and Vatican gendarme commander Gianluca Gauzzi met with the prosecutor and deputy prosecutor of Perugia, Italy, on September 17.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office of Perugia is responsible for investigating crimes committed by magistrates and prosecutors in Rome.

During the meeting, the two judicial offices agreed to cooperate in an ongoing investigation into “unauthorized access to a computer or telematics system,” a crime under Italian law, for the clandestine collection of information about individuals. In common Italian language, the action is often called “dossieraggio.”

It has not been made public for what purpose the information was collected or whether this was done on behalf of anyone.

The Perugia prosecutor has pursued a lieutenant of Italy’s financial police, Pasquale Striano, who worked for the National Office for Combating Mafia and Terrorism, and one of the office’s prosecutors, Antonio Laudati, on suspicion of having accessed non-public information on possibly 172 Italian politicians and other media figures.

Striano is also accused of being the source of reports published by two journalists from Italian daily Domani, who are also under investigation for allegedly reporting confidential information, Italian newspaper Il Giornale reported.

Striano and Laudati have both publicly denied the allegations.

According to a report from the news agency, Vatican prosecutor Diddi has also opened his own case over the “alleged illegal access (to information) during the investigation into the well-known investigation into the purchase of the London building.”

Il Giornale also reported in March on allegations that Striano had been asked in 2019 by an unknown person, possibly someone inside the Vatican, to obtain information on at least five people, all of whom were later charged and convicted in the major Vatican financial trial that concluded in December 2023: Cardinal Angelo Becciu, Cecilia Marogna, Raffaele Mincione, Fabrizio Tirabassi and Gianluigi Torzi.

In 2019, the Vatican Public Prosecutor’s Office had just begun its investigation into the Secretariat of State’s investment in London. The office brought a case against ten individuals who were later charged with crimes including financial fraud.