Vatican City
Reuters
The prosecutor at a Vatican corruption trial linked to a botched London real estate deal asked a court on Wednesday to convict Cardinal Angelo Becciu and sentence the former Holy See power broker to seven years and three months in jail.
Prosecutor Alessandro Diddi made the request at the end of his summing up at the trial, which began two years ago this month and where Becciu, 75, is one of 10 defendants.
All of them have denied any wrongdoing.
Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu near the Vatican, in Rome, Italy, on 25th September, 2020. PICTURE: Reuters/Guglielmo Mangiapane/File photo
The court’s decision is expected at the end of year after a summer break and more hearings involving those seeking damages, such as the Vatican bank.
The trial revolves mostly around the complicated purchase of a building in London by the Secretariat of State, where Becciu once held the number two position.
Pope Francis fired Becciu, the highest-ranking Vatican official to ever face a trial, from another senior clerical post in 2020 for alleged nepotism. That accusation surfaced often at the trial and Becciu denied that as well.
In a statement released before the prosecution made its requests, Becciu said he was “pained” by the way Diddi had painted him as a sinister character.
“I have always worked for the good of the Church and I have spent my whole life for her,” Becciu said. “I am innocent not only because not only have I never stolen a cent, nor have I enriched myself or members of my family”.
At the time of Becciu’s firing, he was also stripped of what the Vatican then said were his “rights associated with being a cardinal”.
This included the right to enter a secret conclave to elect the next pope after Francis’s death or resignation.
Before he was fired, Becciu was one of the most powerful men in the Vatican. He was deputy secretary of state from 2011-2018 and then head of the Vatican department that studies potential candidates for sainthood from 2018 to his dismissal in 2020.
The others on trial include several Vatican employees as well as outside brokers who the Vatican has accused of extortion.
