Vatican Trial: The Defense Makes Its Case

“In this trial, which has been shown to be of great complexity, prejudice has sometimes prevailed. The Promoter of Justice was supposed to bring evidence to the court, and he did not do it.” The tone was set in the multipurpose room of the Vatican Museums where on October 19, 2023, the 73rd audience of the trial of the Secretariat of State’s dubious investments unfolded.

Opening the plea for his client, Fabrizio Tirabassi—former employee of the Secretariat of the State accused of money laundering and embezzlement—Cataldo Intrieri strove to contest the results of an investigation presented by the Vatican’s Promotor of Justice, Alessandro Diddi.

As for the Secretariat of State’s management of funds, he emphasized that the sums in question “were the money of the Pope, entrusted to the care of the Secretariat of State, and no one won a euro in this story.” The lawyer added that a “bad investment does not constitute a crime.”

According to the defense, “state policy looms over the debates,” and the investigation has assumed a “dystopian” dimension. “We constructed a colossal plot and a no less colossal scenario around the affair of the London building, of which (my client) would have pulled the strings,” explains Intrieri, who thinks that these accusations “melted like snow in the sun” during the previous hearings.

Responding to Paola Severino (the lawyer of the Secretariat of State pursuing a civil case in the trial), who had underlined the profoundly “ethical” dimension of the ongoing trial, Cataldo Intrieri emphasized the limits of a “symbolic” trial in the course of which “the accused himself becomes a symbol,” even a “scapegoat.”

Bear in mind that on July 26, Promoter of Justice Alessandro Diddi—the equivalent of an attorney general—had asked for Fabrizio Tirabassi to be given a sentence of 13 years and 3 months of imprisonment, a perpetual ban on being employed in public service, and a fine of 18,750 euros, as well as the confiscation of close to 100 million euros.