If Opus Dei is guilty, so is the entire Church.
-- William O'Connor
THE OUTLINE OF A PLOT WAS LAID OUT IN THE RECORDS OF Carboni's phone calls while shadowing Calvi's progress from Trieste to London, which were produced in evidence at the second inquest in London. Obtained from the hotels in which Carboni had stayed, they confirmed he had been in daily contact with Hilary Franco, Rome lawyer Wilfredo Vitalone and the main Vatican switchboard. There seemed no doubt that the orders had come from Rome.
The next breakthrough occurred when lawyers acting for the Calvi family stumbled across criminal proceedings in Trieste involving Silvano Vittor's attempt to sell agent 'Podgora' part of the contents of Calvi's missing briefcase. The undercover agent's real name was Eligio Paoli, and he worked in Trieste for the Guardia di Finanza, and probably SISMI. He was only one of at least four agents working for different Italian agencies who knew details of Calvi's flight. It was Podgora who learned that Sergio Vaccari had been hired to assist in Calvi's murder.
By then Gelli decided he had been behind bars long enough and succeeded in bribing a guard to smuggle him out of prison in a laundry hamper. Within a few days of his escape, a Spanish passport was waiting for him at the home of Ferdinando Mor, the Italian consul general in Geneva and a former P2 member. [1] Days later Gelli left for South America, stopping off in Madrid on the way. In Madrid it is said that he had talks with Gregorio Lopez Bravo. [2]
Following Calvi's death, Francisco Pazienza had assured Clara that she could always turn for help to two of his closest friends in New York, Father Larry Zorza and Alfonso Bove. They were partners in a Brooklyn funeral parlour and Bove also owned two travel agencies in Manhattan. He called once or twice to ask Carlo about transferring funds from Sicily to Nassau. In the course of their conversations, Bove never sought to hide his Mafia connections.
Father Zorza, on the other hand, was required to resign as Archbishop Cheli's aide at the United Nations after his arrest for smuggling stolen paintings into the United States. On the way to his arraignment, he told a US Customs agent, 'I hope this doesn't take long. I have to say Mass at 5 o'clock.' Zorza then explained to the judge that it had all been a mistake. 'I did it sincerely to help somebody, and now I am terribly sorry ... I have learned a lot.' He was given a three-year suspended sentence. Not long afterwards he was again arrested while trying to sell $40,000 worth of tickets for the Broadway hit 'Les Miserables' back to the box office from where they had been stolen. 'My friends never told me the full story about those tickets,' he assured the judge this time. While the judge deliberated on sentencing, Zorza was arrested a third time, on this occasion for his involvement with the second Pizza Connection that imported Sicilian heroin into the United States.
Pazienza himself was arrested in New York on an Italian warrant for his involvement in Banco Ambrosiano's fraudulent bankruptcy. The police nipped him as he was transmitting 'highly valuable information on terrorism and other matters' to American intelligence agents. A US Customs officer testified in his favour, claiming that before becoming involved with Banco Ambrosiano Pazienza had been one of his country's top intelligence operators and that an 'unidentified group of people' wanted him dead.
While being held in New York, Pazienza made some startling revelations that might have had something to do with the threats on his life. He alleged that the Ambrosiano monies advanced to the United Trading family had been intended for various causes of the Vatican. He added that one-third of the money was stolen by middlemen. The names of Gelli, Ortolani and Tassan Din were given in a Dublin affidavit filed by the liquidators of Banco Andino. Another third went into shoring up the IOR's control of Ambrosiano itself. The final third, he asserted, actually went into the Vatican's covert political causes. In each case he was talking about $450 million, more or less.
And what were those 'Vatican causes'? He mentioned Poland's Solidarity movement, of course, and the Irish Republican Army, as well as various groups or dictatorships opposing the spread of Marxism and Liberation Theology in Latin America.
In the reorganization of the Vatican finances that followed, a new five-member supervisory board of lay experts was created for the IOR. Its president was Angelo Caloia, head of the Mediocredito Lombardo bank. The vice-president was Philippe'de Week. The other three were Dr. Jose Angel Sanchez Asiain, former chairman of Banco Bilbao, Thomas Pietzcker, a director of Deutsche Bank, and Thomas Macioce, an American businessman. The new managing director was Giovanni Bodio, also from the Mediocredito Lombardo.
Caloia and Bodio were both associated with Giuseppe Garofano, the onetime chairman of Montedison and top executive at Ferruzzi Finanziaria S.p.A., Italy's second largest private industrial group after Fiat. Garofano, an Opus Dei supernumerary, served with Caloia on the Vatican's Ethics and Finance Committee, until arrested in 1993 in connection with a $94 million political kickback scheme, a substantial amount of the money for which passed through Ferruzzi's account at the IOR, in the name of the 'Saint Serafino Foundation'. Sanchez Asiain was described by Ruiz-Mateos as one of the 'Valises'. He was close to Alvaro del Portillo and a boyhood friend of Javier Echevarria, though Opus Dei denied he was a member.
The time for tidying up had come. With Calvi dead, Ruiz-Mateos discredited and Jaimes Berti out of circulation, the secret machine had triumphed. In Italy an interminable round of litigation linked to the Ambrosiano and P2 affairs (note, no 'IOR' affair), the likes of which the republic had never known, was getting under way and probably would not conclude before the end of the millennium. In Spain, all was quiet on the juridical front, but there were problems in the upper ranks of Opus Homini.
At the same time a restructuring of the Spanish banking industry was set in motion with a proposal by the country's fourth-rated Banco Bilbao to take over the first-rated Banesto. But Banesto's deputy chairman, Lopez Bravo, backed by his friend and investment partner, Ricardo Tejera Magro, and another associate, steel magnate Jose Maria Aristrain Noain, successfully opposed the merger. Instead the smaller Bilbao merged with Banco Vizcaya to become Spain's largest commercial bank, under the name of Banco BilbaoVizcaya, while Banesto slipped to third position, just ahead of Banco Popular Espanol.
Lopez Bravo, according to Professor Sainz Moreno, was going through a crisis of conscience. After more than thirty years as a loyal member, he wanted to leave Opus Dei. 'He had finally understood that Opus Dei was not a spiritual organization but a financial multinational, and he was in profound conflict with Luis Valls,' the professor said. But Lopez Bravo knew many of the Work's darkest secrets. In fact his deception with Opus Dei began soon after his meeting in Madrid with Licio Gelli at the end of August 1983, as the fugitive was on his way to Montevideo. What had Gelli told him? And who else had Gelli seen in Madrid? Both Swiss and French intelligence sources reported that he had met 'friends in Opus Dei'. [3]
Had Gelli spoken of the secrets contained in Calvi's missing briefcase? Or of the murder of Sergio Vaccari? Strangely, the Italian magistrates had been informed that a high-ranking member of Opus Dei from Spain was in London at the time of Calvi's death. In the same vein, it also would have been interesting to know whether Lopez Bravo spoke about his concerns to his closest associates at the time, Ricardo Tejero and Jose Maria Aristrain. Tejero was not known to have any particular Opus Dei ties, but he was one of the few Spanish bankers who dared stand up to Luis Valls.
Whatever the reasons for his disillusionment, on 19 February 1985 Lopez Bravo planned to go to Bilbao on business. He had a first-class reservation aboard the 9 a.m. Air Iberia flight. He arrived at the airport late, carrying only a briefcase, and was the last person to board the aircraft. The Boeing 727 took off from Madrid fifteen minutes behind schedule, with 148 passengers and crew aboard. As the flight made its approach in bad weather towards Bilbao's Sandica Airport it exploded in mid-air and crashed. Everyone aboard perished.
The first reports spoke of an ETA bomb. But the technical commission investigating the crash later found that the aircraft was off course and had struck the television antenna atop Mount Oiz. It was suggested in the press that the pilot had been seen drinking before takeoff. The crash was attributed to pilot error. The strange thing, commented Professor Sainz Moreno, was that of all the victims, Lopez Bravo was the only one for whom no remains were found. 'Not even his Rolex watch,' he said.
Eight minutes after the Iberia flight had departed Madrid, Ricardo Tejero left his apartment and went down to the underground garage where he kept his car, directly opposite the Edificio Beatriz, home of Banco Popular Espanol's Presidencia. As he paused to unlock his car door, two men approached and shot him in the head. The assassins fled undetected. The police affirmed that it was the work of the Madrid Commando of ETA Militar. They apparently based their conclusion on the fact that the assassins had identified themselves to the doorman of the building by producing outdated badges of the Direccion General de Seguiridad. Similar badges had been found among ETA material seized by an anti-terrorist squad in France a few weeks before.
Barcelona's La Vanguardia was the only newspaper to link the two incidents. The Vanguardia reporter who covered the Tejero assassination walked across the street from the garage to the Banco Popular Presidencia hoping to elicit some comment from the bank's chairman. He was told that Luis Valls had left the bank's premises and returned to his apartment on the floor above. When finally the reporter reached the banker, Luis Valls told him, 'Everyone is completely shattered. It could have happened to me.' Luis Valls kept his two sports cars in the same garage.
The third partner in a Basque shipping venture that Lopez Bravo and Tejero had structured was Jose Maria Aristrain. He and his wife were reportedly Opus Dei supernumeraries. [4] But Aristrain was said to have been expelled from the Work because he had left his wife and taken the glamorous Anja Lopez, wife of France's leading composer of operettas, as his mistress. Aristrain survived his two friends by a little more than a year.
He and Anja Lopez spent their last weekend together at the May 1986 Monte Carlo Grand Prix. They chartered a helicopter to take them back to Cannes-Mandelieu airport where Aristrain had his private aircraft waiting. The helicopter, a four-place Squirrel, rounded Cap d'Antibes into the Golfe de Juan and within sight of the Croisette spun out of the air, exploding upon impact with the water. There were no survivors. An investigation was immediately opened by the public prosecutor of Grasse. Eye-witness reports indicated that the crash was consistent with rear-rotor failure, causing the helicopter to spiral into the sea. The rear rotor is the easiest part on a Squirrel to sabotage. Some media reports suggested the ETA was responsible.
Six weeks before the Cannes accident, Roberto Calvi's black briefcase mysteriously reappeared in a Milan television studio. This media scoop was the assiduous work of the Sardinian property developer Flavio Carboni who was now portraying himself as a protector of Vatican interests. Carboni's brand of protection, however, cost money -- a lot of money. Of course he had very high legal bills as well.
After his arrest in Lugano, Carboni was extradited to Italy at the end of October 1982 and while the charges against him were investigated he was transferred to the prison in Parma. He remained under 'preventive custody' in Parma until August 1984, when his detention was changed to house arrest within the precincts of the city. He rented a suite at Parma's Maria Luigia Hotel and, outside of prison walls for the first time in two years, he lost no time in getting down to work.
In May 1984, Carboni's lawyer in Rome, Luigi D'Agostino, had laid the groundwork by contacting a Polish Jesuit who worked for the Vatican. D'Agostino asked Father Casimiro Przydatek to visit Carboni at Parma prison 'for pastoral reasons'. D'Agostino had excellent Vatican connections since he originally helped Carboni set up the meetings with Cardinal Palazzini and Monsignor Hilary Franco. It is interesting that, as far as is known, rather than unveiling his new mission to Hilary Franco, Carboni chose a Polish priest who spoke Italian haltingly.
Carboni told Father Casimiro that he was not in need of a confessor but wished to make known to the Church hierarchy that he had important documents to sell. Carboni did not state it quite that way, but the intent was the same. 'Carboni proposed himself as a defender of the Church. He said he wished to launch an international press campaign that would clear the Vatican's name in the Ambrosiano affair, because he knew where the Calvi documents were hidden. He assured me the documents proved the Vatican's innocence and he could arrange for their purchase,' the Polish priest said. [5]
Back in Rome, Father Casimiro spoke to Bishop Pavel Hnilica, who was his confessor and the real target of Carboni's strategy. Hnilica was portrayed as the Pope's closest adviser on Church affairs in East Europe. Originally from Trnava, in the heart of Catholic Slovakia, he had been ordained as a Jesuit in secret in 1950, at a time when the Czech authorities were actively persecuting priests as traitors. Paul VI elevated him in secret to the non-existent bishopric of Rusado (located in what was Mauritania Caesariensis, today Algeria). After moving to Rome during the height of the Cold War, Hnilica became the head of Pro Fratribus, which smuggled relief funds and bibles behind the Iron Curtain and assisted Catholic refugees.
Hnilica sent Father Virgilio Rotondi, who was also said to have the Pope's ear, to Parma to meet Carboni. Over the next two months Carboni and Rotondi outlined an international campaign, supposedly designed to gain worldwide sympathy for the Vatican, based upon selected documents from Calvi's briefcase. It was codenamed 'Operation S.C.LV.' after the Italian initials for the Vatican city state. But Carboni wanted almost £20 million to set the operation in motion. He said the money was needed to acquire the Calvi documents, as well as to corrupt politicians, journalists, publishers and magistrates. Moreover, he was asking for £6 million up front to cover 'anticipatory expenses and fees'. [6] Rotondi took the proposal back to Hnilica and they consulted their superiors.
The Bishop of Rusado's first contact with Carboni occurred in November 1984, after the terms of his house arrest were altered to permit him to return to his villa in Rome. Hnilica claimed he had received approval from his superiors to explore Carboni's proposal further. As a sign of good intentions, Carboni handed the bishop three letters written to Roberto Calvi in 1980 by the Turin blackmailer Luigi Cavallo, two of which were originals. He told Hnilica that he knew the whereabouts of other documents but to acquire them he needed cash.
While the Cavallo documents reflected poorly on Calvi, they were not material in proving the Vatican's innocence in the Ambrosiano affair. A further meeting was scheduled for early January 1985 with Father Rotondi. At this meeting Carboni provided copies of two letters written by Calvi -- one on 30 May 1982 to Cardinal Palazzini, and the other on 6 June 1982 to Monsignor Hilary Franco -- as well as a somewhat scissored document which began with the words, 'Monsignor Marcinkus Reproaches Me ...' [7] For these three documents, Father Rotondi gave Carboni a cheque for £190,000. [8]
To help convince Hnilica that the deal was legit, Carboni allied himself with an engaging underworld character by the name of Giulio Lena. Carboni told Hnilica that Lena had put up the money to recover part of the Calvi documents. Lena was one of Rome's more innovative narcotics dealers. But the Bishop of Rusado did not know this. On the contrary, he found Lena charming and cultured. To obtain a percentage of the action, Lena actually bought into Carboni's deal, paying him £600,000. This was a heavy burden for Lena, as his own financial situation was far from rosy.
In May 1985, Lena gave Hnilica an undated letter signed by Calvi with the name of the addressee removed, but certainly intended for the person who - like Beelzebub, prince of the underworld -- he believed could cast out the demons. In it he criticized Gelli and Ortolani, calling them agents of the Devil. He said he was convinced that a collapse of the Ambrosiano would cause the collapse of the Vatican, adding:
Since I am abandoned and betrayed by those I regarded as my most reliable allies, I cannot help but remember the operations I undertook on behalf of the representatives of St. Peter's ... I provided financing throughout Latin America for warships and other military equipment to be used to counter the subversive activities of well organized Communist forces. Thanks to these operations, the Church today can boast a new authority in countries like Argentina, Colombia, Peru and Nicaragua... ..
He ended the letter by saying:
I am tired, really tired, too tired ... The limits of my long patience have been largely overreached ... I insist that all the transactions concerning the political and economic expansion of the Church must be reimbursed; I must be repaid the $1,000 million that I furnished at the express wish of the Vatican in favour of Solidarity; I must be reimbursed the monies used to organize financial centres and political power in five South American countries, an amount totalling $175 million; that I be retained on conditions still to be determined as a financial consultant because of my work as a go-between in many East European and Latin American countries; my peace of mind must be restored ... ; that Casaroli, Silvestrini, Marcinkus and Mennini leave me alone! I will attend to the other obligations on my own!!! [9]
After receiving this document, Hnilica issued Carboni two cheques drawn on the IOR for a total of £61,000. In the meantime, as Lena's financial position was causing some concern Carboni suggested he ask Andreotti for a loan. There had already been some prior discussion between Carboni and his brother Andrea about whether some of the documents recovered from Calvi's briefcase should be sent directly to Palazzini and also, through Senator Claudio Vitalone, to Andreotti. [10]
Lena was told that a letter introducing him to Andreotti had been delivered by Sister Sandra Mennini, daughter of IOR director Dr Luigi Mennini. This she later denied. In any event, within a few days of the letter being drafted, Lena received a four-month loan of 400 million lire (£168,000) at the Rome Savings Bank. To cover the loan, on 15 November 1985 Hnilica gave him two IOR cheques which the Bishop signed and left blank, with instructions to hold them until told for what amount they could be cashed. A few weeks later Lena was instructed to fill them out for 600 million lire (£252,000) each and present them for payment twenty days apart. [11]
Lena's joy was short-lived as both cheques were refused. When informed, the Bishop of Rusado was beside himself. He assured Carboni that the cheques were covered and that the IOR was blocking them for political reasons. Carboni accepted this, but demanded that Hnilica replace the cheques, which the bishop did, issuing at the end of March 1986 another twelve cheques drawn on different accounts at different banks for a total of £458,000. When later questioned, Hnilica said that Carboni had told him that 'the famous Calvi briefcase which he had already shown me' would be unveiled to the public on the SPOT TV show. 'Carboni told me that after the broadcast he would be obliged to hand over the briefcase to the Milan magistrates. [12] SPOT was a magazine programme hosted by political commentator Enzo Biagi.
With the Pro Fratribus replacement cheques in hand, Carboni assured Hnilica that the SPOT transmission, to which he was committed, would be a triumph for the Vatican, as it proved that the Vatican had nothing to fear from the ghost of Roberto Calvi. On camera Enzo Biagi introduced the neo-Fascist Senator Giorgio Pisano to his viewers as the person who had uncovered the briefcase. Pisano, who had written a book entitled The Calvi Murder, claimed he had bought it for £20,000 in an after-dark encounter with two unknown individuals. The reason for his interest, he affirmed, was because he wished to put this key piece of evidence into the hands of the authorities. Carboni and Silvano Vittor were present on the set as well to attest that it was the same satchel they had seen in Calvi's possession in London. 'He held onto it like a drowning man clutches a life-saver,' Carboni delicately recalled.
What Calvi's Rome driver had described as a 'bulging, heavier-than- usual' bag appeared empty-cheeked before the cameras. As it was opened -- allegedly for the first time since its disappearance -- the cameras zoomed in to discover its contents. Predictably, it contained no notebook, no agenda, no address book, and no bunches of strongbox keys. It did contain Calvi's driving licence, a Nicaraguan passport in his name and the keys to the Calvi apartment in Milan and the house at Drezzo. It also contained eight documents - not exactly an arsenal of ammunition for God's Banker to use against Beelzebub's demons. The documents were the following:
1. Letter of Calvi to Cardinal Palazzini, dated 30 May 1982
2. Letter of Calvi to Mgr Hilary Franco, dated 6 June 1982
3. Letter of Carboni to Calvi, dated 6 June 1982
4. Undated note: 'Mgr Marcinkus reproaches me ...'
5. Undated memorandum headed: 'Re: Conversation with Roberto Calvi, banker of the Ambrosiano and launderer of dirty money ...'
6. Letter from Luigi Cavallo to Calvi, dated 9 July 1980, 'As you might imagine ...'
7. Letter from Luigi Cavallo to Calvi, 'Among the tribes of Uganda ...'
8. Letter from Luigi Cavallo to Calvi, 'A few days ago I was on holiday by the sea ...'
The prying by state television into a dead man's briefcase for the financial gain and prestige of the show's promoters, with two of the principal conspirators in the banker's disappearance on the set, seemed the height of bad taste. But, after all, it was April Fools' Day 1986. The general public, meanwhile, was unaware of the dealings between Carboni and the Bishop of Rusado. These only came to light two years later following the forced boarding off the Italian coast of a yacht flying a Spanish royal standard. Customs police found on board the yacht 1,800 kilos of Lebanese hashish. The consignee was Dr. Giulio Lena. In charge of the investigation was Rome examining magistrate Dr Mario Almerighi, who obtained a warrant to search Lena's villa in the Alban hills outside of Rome.
Almerighi not only turned up evidence of a major narcotics ring and also the counterfeiting of Central African Republic banknotes but he uncovered Lena's dealings with the Bishop of Rusado. This led the magistrate to search the Pro Fratribus offices. Hnilica at first denied everything, but the evidence was overwhelming. The documents uncovered at Pro Fratribus showed that Hnilica had acted with the knowledge of the highest Vatican authorities, even though the Vatican's financial support had been withdrawn in mid-stream, forcing him to turn instead to underworld loan sharks to raise the funds that Carboni demanded.
Among the evidence sequestered at Pro Fratribus was a SISMI file on Flavio Carboni, 12 Calvi documents, a letter from Hnilica to the Cardinal Secretary of State, Casaroli, explaining his negotiations with Carboni and cashed cheques totalling £1.5 million. But the most condemning item was Cardinal Casaroli's reply to Hnilica in which the Vatican's number-two disclosed he had informed the Pope of the latest developments. Casaroli's letter stated:
Most Reverend Excellency,
I have received and read with great attention your letter of 25 August concerning your efforts with others relative to the problems of the IOR.
Appreciating the importance and gravity of the situation which you set forth, I thought it important before replying to you to inform the Holy Father.
In his name I am able to convey to you the great pain and preoccupation caused by what we learned from your letter. Neither the Holy Father nor the Holy See were aware of the activities that you summarily set forth.
It is first necessary to mention, in order to avoid all misunderstanding, that your efforts were undertaken without any order, authorization or approbation from the Holy See.
Moreover, one cannot deny that the notable economic situation into which the Holy See -- seriously in deficit -- has fallen would render it extremely difficult, in any case, to meet the request formulated by Your Excellency and to be thus relieved, the Holy See as well as yourself, of the burden of the immense indebtedness which you have revealed to us.
Concerning the causes and modalities of your efforts to shed full light on this apparent indebtedness it is, of course, necessary to estimate the legal consequences that your intervention, based on the best of intentions, could encounter.
By this letter I profit from these circumstances to confirm the distinguished esteem which we hold for you before Our Lord.
It was a strange letter for the secretary of state to have written. It attempted to distance the Holy See from Hnilica's endeavours. 'We had no idea ...' But was this posturing for the record, as the secretary of state was worried about the legal consequences of Hnilica's actions? It also inferred that Rotondi's initial cheque for £190,000 had directly come from the Vatican coffers. But more striking was that the letter contained no order to desist, only to proceed with extreme caution, without directly involving the Holy See, and with whatever resources Hnilica himself could mobilize -- and all this with the 'distinguished esteem' of the two highest authorities of the Catholic Church. Casaroli's letter was therefore Hnilica's authorization to proceed, but at his own risk and peril.
Casaroli's letter begged a number of questions:
1. The 'esteem' of the Pope and the secretary of state for the results that Hnilica had already achieved made one wonder what other documents the Bishop of Rusado had acquired from Carboni. Almerighi was fairly certain that for the £1.5 million which the Vatican and Pro Fratribus had already paid, Carboni must have delivered more than Hnilica was willing to admit. 'Hnilica', Almerighi said privately, 'was not telling all the truth.'
2. What happened to the United Trading documents? The secret accounting kept by Calvi for the United Trading family was his first line of defence. The banker had made it clear that only with these documents could he defend himself against the allegations by Marcinkus that he had breached the IOR's trust. An up-to-date accounting for United Trading existed. Carlo Calvi had seen his father working on one. In his testimony, Carlo Calvi said, 'I recall in March 1982 seeing my father in his study at Drezzo working on a 1982 version of those accounts ... These tabulations have never been found, neither in the house at Drezzo, nor the apartment in Milan, or anywhere else. My father always carried these accounts with him. We can suppose that they were with him in his briefcase during his last trip to London ... I remember in fact having seen my father place those tabulations in his briefcase ...' [13]
3. What were the reasons for the IOR's sabotage of Hnilica's initiative? Was it because the IOR's directorate had done a separate deal with Carboni to get hold of the missing accounting documents it wanted? The absence of these documents suggest that the IOR -- by then controlled by Opus Dei, if we can believe Calvi's last words -- had indeed come to a separate arrangement.
4. The moral implications of the Vatican's involvement in these machinations were unsettling. Did the Holy See have such terrible things to hide that it needed to resort to Carboni's services? In Calvi's letter to the Pope of 5 June 1982 he referred to his role in financing arms shipments to Latin American dictatorships, providing financial support to Solidarity and financing other dissident groups in East Europe. Calvi would not have made this claim if he did not have the documentation at hand. What happened to those documents?
5. By leaving Hnilica out in the cold, did the Secretary of State realize he was pushing the Bishop of Rusado into dealing with underworld loan sharks? With Carboni threatening, on 17 March 1987 Pro Fratribus mandated Vittore Pascucci to raise a $10-million six-month loan. Pro Fratribus received an advance of £1.26 million from Pascucci at usurious rates. Pascucci was described by a secret Guardia di Finanza report as the 'dominus' behind Eurotrust Bank Limited of Crocus Hill, capital of the break-away island state of Anguilla, in the Lesser Antilles. Although not licensed to operate abroad, Eurotrust Bank had an office in Rome under the name of Eurotrust S.p.A. Eurotrust Bank was under investigation for alleged laundering of narcodollars on behalf of the Mafia. [14]
6. Most important of all, how much did the Pope know? Were his Opus Dei advisers, the men who handled -- according to Calvi and others -- the Vatican finances, keeping him in the dark? According to Hnilica, the Pope's mail was filtered by the Secretariat of State. Other sources have indicated the Pope was told only what his advisers wanted to tell him.
Hoping to learn some of these answers, Almerighi subpoenaed Monsignor Hilary Franco. He had discovered that Franco's real (baptized) name was Ilario Carmine Franco, born not at all in New York but in Calabria. He questioned Franco for forty-five minutes before giving up. He found the Grade 1 Minor Official (Step 2) of the Roman Curia 'evasive and untruthful'.
Moreover, Opus Dei in Rome had put out another statement by then repeating that the Prelature 'has absolutely no connection with the Calvi affair' and that Hilary Franco 'has never had any contact with Opus Dei, nor with any of its members'. This seemed unlikely, if for no other reason than Franco had been on the staff of the Congregation of the Clergy, to which Alvaro del Portillo was a consultor and Opus Dei's Alberto Cosme do Amaral, Bishop of Leira, a member of the directorate.
The statement also trotted out the, by then, well-worn refrain that Don Mario Lantini, regional vicar for Italy, had 'invited' Calvi's widow by registered letter 'to justify, with full details, the basis on which she made her assertions' that her husband had dealings with Opus Dei. 'He has yet to receive a reply.'
It appeared that Carboni had used the contents of Calvi's briefcase at his convenience, removing from it scores of documents while leaving only those he supposed would further his plan, and inserting others that originally had not been there. It is difficult, for example, to understand why Calvi would carry with him on his last journey documents relating to his alleged treachery against Sindona. Nor would he have wanted to carry with him the document, 'Conversation with Roberto Calvi, banker of the Ambrosiano and launderer of dirty money'.
The presence of such documents in his briefcase when shown on TV logically suited the objectives of Carboni and those who found it expedient to maintain that Calvi was a man of low morals and no credibility - a man who, when he said, 'Opus Dei was in control of the IOR,' was not to be believed. 'The object was to dirty the image of Calvi ... and make him appear as the number-one defrauder of the Vatican bank,' concluded Almerighi. [15]
Almerighi recommended that Carboni, Lena and Hnilica be sent for trial under article 648 of the criminal code. Article 648 concerns the relatively minor offence of dealing in stolen goods, the maximum punishment for which, if found guilty, is a five-year prison sentence. It was not much, but it was a beginning. In March 1993, all three were found guilty, but the verdict was later overturned because of 'faulty legal procedure'.
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Notes:
1. I Ferdinando Mor testimony before the Chamber of Deputies P2 Commission, Vol. CLVII, Doc. XXIII, No. 2 Ter 13, pp. 554-555.
2. Ibid., p. 555.
3. Isabel Domon, 'L'arme qui aurait permis a Gelli de quitter la Suisse', 24 Heures, Lausanne, 21 October 1983.
4. Both Golias (No. 30, Summer 1992. p. 126) and Tiempo (No. 218, 20 July 1986, p. 32) identify Jose Maria Arisrrain Noain as an Opus Dei member.
5. Almerighi Ordinanza, Section 6.2, p. 141.
6. Ibid., Section 9.3, p. 226.
7. Ibid., Section 11.2, p. 283.
8. Ibid., Section 11.2, p. 278n., and Section 11.4, p. 305n.
9. Ibid., Section 1.3, pp. 11-14.
10. Ibid., Section 2.2, p. 29.
11. Ibid., section 12.1, p. 310.
12. Idem.
13. Ibid., section 12.2.2, p. 330.
14. Nucleo Centrale Polizia Tributaria della Guardia di Finanza, VII Gruppo, 1 ͦ Sezione, Report No. 1429, Rome, 12 October 1990.
15. Almerighi Ordinanza, Section 12.2.2, p. 328.