Does Pope Francis need to appoint a Vatican ‘special prosecutor’?

Messages exchanged between witnesses in the Vatican financial crimes trial appear to show collusion between them and the prosecutors' office

Messages exchanged between witnesses in the Vatican financial crimes trial appear to show collusion between them as they prepared to give evidence, according to new Italian media reports.

Vatican City Promoter of Justice Alessandro Diddi. Pillar file photo.

But the exchanges between some of the most high-profile people to give evidence at the trial, which concluded in December 2023, appear to point to more than just unseemly cooperation between themselves, and suggest consistent cooperation between witnesses and the Vatican City Office of the Promoter of Justice.

Even more concerning for the Vatican is the possibility of possible perjury by some witnesses in the trial — and that the prosecution may have been aware of it as it occurred.

The messages return the spotlight to the Vatican’s chief prosecutor, Alessandro Diddi, a combustible and controversial figure, who has been accused by defendants in the trial of unfair and inappropriate conduct.

And with an appeal court due to consider the case later this year, the conduct of Diddi’s office is likely to come under increased scrutiny.

As international attention turns again towards the case, Pope Francis may find himself with a weighing exercise on his hands: On one, the need to appoint someone to investigate his own prosecutor’s office, and on the other, the risk of a what a special investigator might actually turn up.

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In a series of stories carried by the Italian newspaper Domani, new details emerged April 14 of the contents of text messages, exchanged via encrypted apps, between Genoveffa Ciferri and Francesca Chaouqui in which they discussed the cooperation of Msgr. Alberto Perlasca with Vatican investigators.

Perlasca was, for years, the head of the administrative office of the Secretariat of State and a chief deputy of Cardinal Angelo Becciu, the star defendant in the trial.

Perlasca’s decision to cooperate with prosecutors led to some of the most headline-grabbing accusations against Becciu before and during the trial, during which the priest also claimed that Chaouqui — through Ciferri, a personal friend of Perlasca — had unwittingly encouraged him to cooperate with prosecutors.

Chaouqui’s involvement in the case made headlines and caused a stir in court, since she was at the center of the last Vatican financial scandal and trial, and convicted in 2016 of leaking classified Vatican information in the so-called “Vatileaks 2.0” scandal.

When the involvement of the women in coordinating Perlasca’s statements to investigators came to light in 2022, prosecutor Diddi told the judges that he had received a cache of messages between Chaouqui and Ciferri, which had led him to open a new investigation.

Although Diddi filed many of the exchanges as evidence in the trial, he withheld dozens of messages, arguing to the court that they were under separate investigation by his office and had to remain confidential.

While Diddi did not identify the source of the messages, several people close to the case have said they believe them to have come from Chaouqui herself.

And, according to exchanges now by Domani, they suggest a level of cooperation between Chaouqui and Diddi’s office which verges on systematic, with the woman showing detailed advance knowledge of several procedural moves by Diddi’s office, and details of the prosecutor’s case.

Ciferri herself remarked in the exchanges: “It’s fantastic how you know these indiscretions! In any case, I will never allow myself to ask you how you do it and who you deal with,” she messaged Chaouqui. “It’s enough for me to have noticed that they are one hundred percent true.”

While the messages contain no specific allegation that Diddi himself was the point of contact in the Office of the Promoter of Justice — and he has insisted he had no personal contact with her — they do raise serious questions about the security of the prosecutor’s office, however.

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As the women found themselves publicly drawn into the case and called before the Vatican City court for questioning, Chaouqui warned Ciferri in 2022 that “We need to understand what you have to say” in order to “prevent [these] chats from being considered [usable in court] if we ever decide to declassify them.”

“Because in that case Becciu would be right,” Chaouqi said. “The bomb must be defused. For me, what I said at the trial is valid. I don’t know Diddi. If it comes out that we were all in agreement, it’s the end.”

Cardinal Becciu maintained during the trial that Chaouqi’s involvement was proof of a conspiracy against him and petitioned the court to dismiss the case — which judges declined.

Chaouqui, a PR consultant, was appointed by Pope Francis to serve on a special commission to recommend financial reforms during the first days of his pontificate in 2013. She was subsequently convicted by a Vatican court in 2016 of leaking confidential information to journalists and handed a 10 month suspended prison sentence.

Dubbed “La bomba sexy” and “the popess” by Italian tabloids, Chaouqui has had a long and public personal feud with Becciu, whom she blames for her trial and conviction.

And according to leaked text messages published in 2020, she texted Becciu in 2017 demanding his help rehabilitating her reputation, and warning him about things “that could get you in serious trouble I’m keeping to myself.”

She’s also said to have presented herself to prosecutors in 2020, shortly after Becciu was sacked by Pope Francis but before he criminally charged, with an offer to cooperate with any investigation into him.

In a statement following the Domani stories this week, Becciu said the messages proved what he has maintained “from the beginning.”

“I spoke of a plot against me: an investigation built on falsehoods, which five years ago unjustly devastated my life and exposed me to a pillory of global proportions,” the cardinal said. “Now, finally, I hope that the time of deception has come to an end.”

While there is a sense that anything is possible in the world of Vatican City tribunals, the revelations are unlikely to weigh so heavily with appeal judges as to see Becciu’s conviction overturned.

The cardinal was convicted in 2023 of multiple financial crimes, and while Perlasca’s initial cooperation with investigators drew much attention to the case, the cleric’s testimony was secondary to documentary evidence produced in court.

The judges ruled that Becciu had illegally funneled Vatican funds to the benefit of other defendants in the trial — including over investments that became known as the London property scandal.

Separately, the judges found that Becciu was also culpable for passing more than half a million euros to his self-described “security consultant” and private spy Cecilia Marogna.

Throughout the course of the trial, Becciu repeatedly attempted to argue that his payments to Marogna were personally and secretly authorized by Pope Francis.

However, secret recordings by Becciu of conversations between him and the pope, as well as private letters between them submitted as evidence during the trial showed Francis repeatedly denying knowledge of the affair.

Becciu was also convicted of funneling Church funds to his brother, Antonio Becciu, in a case which has sparked a parallel Italian criminal investigation. Antonio Becciu is accused, along with others connected to the cardinal in his native Sardinia, with receiving Church funds meant for a local Catholic charity into his personal bank account.

None of those convictions were handed down by the judges based substantially on evidence coming from Perlasca working with Chaouqui through Ciferri. But that doesn’t mean appeal court judges won’t have questions, for the women and for the Office of the Promoter of Justice.

Chaouqui’s apparently in-terms suggestion that she and Ciferri get their stories straight before appearing in court and neutralizing the “bomb” of their work together suggests at least some acknowledgement of misconduct.

Perhaps more significant is another text: “For me, what I said at the trial is valid. I don’t know Diddi. If it comes out that we were all in agreement, it’s the end.”

That will will suggest to some, and it will certainly be put to the judges at some point, that there was a possible conspiracy to commit perjury by Chaouqui, Ciferri, and at least someone in Diddi’s office.

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If it emerged that the prosecutors allowed statements they knew to be false to be made in court unchallenged, it would add fuel to accusations against Diddi’s office and how it does business.

Judges and court-watchers alike challenged Diddi’s handling of the prosecution of the landmark financial crimes trial, in which he set out to prove a “vast network of relationships” by drawing together dozens of different instances of apparent financial malpractice or corruption into one grand conspiracy.

Handing down their convictions in 2023, Vatican judges concluded that serious crimes had been committed by almost all of the defendants, but they largely rejected Diddi’s central arguments and theory of the case — leading the promoter of justice to appeal a result he had essentially won, alongside the defendants.

He has often appeared to court publicity, including by unsuccessfully trying to bring charges against journalists who irritate him.

Diddi has also been accused of tactics which amount to intimidation and harassment, and is alleged to have refused offers of cooperation by defendants.

While Cardinal Becciu has been first to put out a statement over the new messages, and has long claimed he is the victim of a conspiracy, Diddi’s most substantive critic has been Raffaele Mincione, the investment manager convicted in Vatican City over his role in the London property scandal.

Mincione has previously told The Pillar that Diddi’s office rebuffed repeated offers to cooperate with its investigation or consider financial documents related to the case because the evidence would undercut his theory of a single unified conspiracy among the defendants.

Mincione has also previously alleged harassment of his legal team by Diddi’s office. Indeed the message exchanges reported by Domani were reportedly part of evidence filed by Mincione’s legal team with the UN Human Rights Council’s Special Rapporteur last year, as part of a complaint brought against the Vatican.

In addition to allegations made by Mincione’s team against Diddi’s office, his conviction has struck many trial-watchers as the weakest of the convictions handed down in the Vatican.

If it were to emerge during appeal hearings that either Diddi or someone in his office colluded with witnesses to either make false statements in court or mislead judges through their testimony, it could add serious weight to Mincione’s claims that he was subjected to an unfair trial. And pressure on the Vatican, including Pope Francis, to address the issue would be significant.

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In other governing jurisdictions, reasonable grounds of suspicion against the public prosecutors in a high-profile criminal case would likely result in the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the claims.

In the Vatican’s case, though, only the pope could make such an appointment. And it is unclear whom Francis could task with such a job who would bring a presumption of credibility to the role — or who would accept the position if it were offered.

Previous independent appointments to investigate Vatican departments have not ended well. Francis’ previous pick to serve as the first auditor general of the Vatican, Libero Milone, found himself accused of “spying” on officials he was charged with investigating and forced from office.

Milone is still seeking redress for his treatment in Vatican courts.

In addition to difficulties in identifying someone who could serve effectively to investigate any potential misconduct by the Office of the Promoter of Justice, the pope would also likely consider the potential cost of what they could find.

If it emerged that there was individual or even collective misconduct — including possible collusion with perjury — it could bring not just the financial crimes trial but the entire Vatican City judicial system into disrepute.

But, weighed against that would be the institutional risk of serious allegations going uninvestigated and unanswered.

Given the Holy See’s unique status in international law and as a non-member observer at the U.N., Mincione’s appeal to the body’s human rights council may struggle to find a formal legal footing.

But given the unfolding and escalating financial crisis facing the Vatican, the Holy See might find itself more than usually vulnerable to diplomatic pressure.

If a real liquidity crisis were to hit, international good will might be the only thing standing between the Vatican and financial meltdown and the suspension of Vatican institutions’ access to the basic channels of international finance.

In such an event, having the basic health and credibility of the city state’s rule of law under general suspicion could be calamitous.