78 Luriealso, “$20 Million in Debt, Says the Vatican in Its First-Ever Public Disclosure.” There was also speculation that John Paul II was considering streamlining the Curia—seemingly a favorite theme of every newly elected Pope since Pius XII—and that reform of the IOR might be in the offing. John Paul II did not tackle any change at the Vatican Bank. See generally Joseph McLellan, “The Vatican: John Paul II May Make the Bureaucracy That Runs the Church Change,” The Washington Post, October 7, 1979, 22.
79 Victor Simpson, Associated Press, International News, Vatican City, A.M. cycle, November 9, 1979.
80 Lai, Finanze vaticane, 59–60.
81 Marcinkus set the meeting with Garner for the day after a Cisalpine board meeting in Geneva. Raw, The Moneychangers, 274–75.
82 Garner made several pages of written notes about the meeting five days later, on December 10. They are the basis for this brief reconstruction of what happened at their discussion. In 1985, Cisalpine’s liquidators sued Coopers & Lybrand, alleging it had been grossly negligent in its accounting. Coopers & Lybrand in turn countersued Marcinkus and the IOR, charging that Marcinkus had “by reason of misrepresentations made fraudulently or otherwise wrongfully” caused the accountants to rely on the wrong information. As part of its answer, the IOR did not admit that Garner’s version of the December 5 meeting was correct. But it also did not provide an alternative version. See generally Raw, The Moneychangers, 276.
83 Ibid., 279.
84 Ibid., 279–80.
85 The IOR had reduced the amount owed by Cisalpine by $90 million during 1978–79. As for the promissory notes bought by the IOR in 1980, they were issued by Andino and BAH. Raw, The Moneychangers, 279–80, 310.
86 Hoffman, Anatomy of the Vatican, 193.
87 Tosches, Power on Earth, 217.
88 Hoffman, Anatomy of the Vatican, 193; Tosches, Power on Earth, 217.
89 Raw, The Moneychangers, 279. Pope John Paul II had promoted Casaroli to the Secretary of State position on April 30, 1979.
90 Tosches, Power on Earth, 218.
91 Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 46.
92 A few years later, author Nick Tosches wrote to Cardinal Guerri about Sindona. The cardinal wrote a reply: “I must attest that in all negotiations Avvocato Sindona behaved in an extremely correct manner and with the greatest fairness.” Tosches, Power on Earth, 218–19.
93 Author interview with Francesco Pazienza, September 20, 22, 2013. Archbishop Celata did not respond to a request for an interview. Over half a dozen interviews with the author, Pazienza reiterated and expanded on much of the information he had provided to journalists in earlier years, especially his 1986 talk, while he was incarcerated in Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center awaiting extradition to Italy, with author Charles Raw. See also Pazienza interviewed in Raw, The Moneychangers, 323.
In some published accounts, Santovito and Pazienza are described as relatives (see Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 180). “That is completely false,” Pazienza told the author. “Our families come from the same town in Italy, that’s all.” Author interview with Francesco Pazienza, September 20, 2013.
94 Author interview with Francesco Pazienza, September 21, 2013.
95 Ibid.
96 Ibid.
97 Tosches, Power on Earth, 219.
98 Sindona actually left the U.S. on August 2, the day he was reported missing, on a TWA flight to Vienna, traveling as Bonamico. He was met by Masonic friends of Gelli, who drove him to Sicily. In 1985, Sindona proved himself a creative fabulist when he gave author Nick Tosches a convoluted explanation for the motive behind his fake kidnapping. According to Sindona, communists in Sicily had plotted to steal nuclear missiles from an American military base. Sindona told Tosches that “my reputation in the region was powerful enough to attract huge numbers of Sicilians.” Just by being there, he was certain he could assist Gelli’s Masons in thwarting the communist plot. See Simoni and Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 14, n. 2; Tosches, Power on Earth, 203–9; DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 243–57.
99 Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It, 163–74; see also statement made by Francesco Di Carlo at the hearing on October 30, 1996, of the Andreotti trial (Palermo Court, Judgment of October 23, 1999, cap. VI, § 1, p. 1910).
100 “Financier Indicted in Mafia Drug Investigation,” Associated Press, International News, Palermo, A.M. cycle, December 11, 1981.
101 DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 254–56.
102 Paul Serafini, “Financier’s Bail Revoked Before His Trial Begins,” Associated Press, Domestic News, New York, A.M. cycle, February 6, 1980.
103 Arnold H. Lubasch, “Ex-Associate Heard at Sindona’s Trial,” The New York Times, February 8, 1980, D3. In return for his testimony, Bordoni served only five months of a seven-year sentence at Danbury, Connecticut’s minimum-security camp. Allowed to remain free on bail while preparing to testify against Massimo Spada and others in Italy, he vanished. He was eventually run to ground and tried and convicted of financial crimes in Italy. See Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It.
104 “Govt. Set to Rest Case on Sindona with Charge of Faked Kidnapping,” The American Banker, March 6, 1980. Four and a half years after Sindona’s trial, the U.S. Attorney in New Jersey charged Rosario Gambino, a foot soldier in the Gambino crime family, with having facilitated Sindona’s fake kidnapping. That count was subsumed under heroin trafficking for which he was subsequently indicted and convicted.
105 Ann Crittenden, “Sindona Faces a Lifetime in Jail, Here and Abroad,” The New York Times, March 30, 1980, E6.
106 The original ninety-nine-count indictment had been replaced with a superseding indictment of sixty-nine counts on January 11, 1980. Sindona was found guilty of sixty-five counts. Arnold H. Lubasch, “Sindona Is Convicted by U.S. Jury of Fraud in Franklin Bank Failure,” The New York Times, March 28, 1980, A1; “Michele Sindona: Convicted,” The Economist, April 5, 1980, 78. See also Harry Anderson and Rich Thomas, “Inside the Vatican Bank,” Newsweek, September 13, 1982, 62.
107 Sindona interviewed in Tosches, Power on Earth, 229–30; DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 258.
108 “Sindona Back in Jail,” The New York Times, June 11, 1980, B5.
109 Lee A. Daniels, “Sindona Is Given a 25-Year Term, Fined $207,000,” The New York Times, June 14, 1980, 25. The U.S. Attorney indicted Sindona again on October 7, five months after his conviction of fraud for misappropriating millions from Franklin National. The new charges were for jumping bail and perjury related to his kidnapping fairy tale. He was convicted in April 1981, and two and a half years were added to his twenty-five-year Franklin sentence. See generally DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 258–59.
110 Hill had provided critical information to the FBI regarding the $6 million Lufthansa cargo heist at JFK Airport as well as about a mob ring that fixed college basketball games. Joseph P. Fried, “U.S. Bids to Send Sindona to Italy,” The New York Times, December 18, 1983, 49.
111 Ibid.; see also Gregg Hill, On the Run: A Mafia Childhood (New York: Warner, 2004).
112 DiFonzo, “Justifiable Homicide,” 32.
113 Hill independently told the FBI that Sindona, and his son, Nino, had invested in a food import company that was a front for importing heroin. Notwithstanding many suspicions, the FBI never developed enough evidence to prove Ace Pizza was a front for an illegal business.
114 Nino Sindona interviewed in DiFonzo, “Justifiable Homicide,” 33. DiFonzo wrote in his 1983 New York magazine article, “U.S. government sources say they expect that Nino Sindona will be arrested and charged with obstruction of justice and being an accessory after-the-fact.” Federal prosecutors, wrote DiFonzo, were confident that they could leverage Sindona with an indictment against his son. But Nino was never charged.
115 DiFonzo, “Justifiable Homicide,” New York Mag
azine.
116 “Italian Police Charge Sindona with Ordering Murder,” Associated Press, Milan, International News, A.M. cycle, July 17, 1981.
117 “Alleged Sindona Hit Man Dies in Escape Attempt,” Associated Press, New York, Domestic News, A.M. cycle, February 20, 1984.
118 Months before Arcio was to be extradited to Italy in 1984 to stand trial as the Ambrosoli gunman, he fell to his death while trying to escape from Manhattan’s Metropolitan Detention Center. Police claimed he fell five floors after cutting through the bars of his ninth-floor cell and then losing his grip on a makeshift rope cobbled together from bedsheets. “Alleged Sindona Hit Man Dies in Escape Attempt,” Associated Press.
As for Italian efforts behind the scenes to get Sindona brought back to Italy for trial, see generally Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry on the Case Sindona and Responsibilities both Political and Administrative related to it, VIII legislature, Doc No. XXIII, 2-series, Final Report of the majority, Report of Joseph Azzaro, Rome, March 24, 1982.
119 Cornwell, God’s Banker, 125–26; Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 63.
120 “Police Arrest Two Suspected Accomplices of Michele Sindona,” International News, Rome, A.M cycle, Feburary 5, 1981.
121 “Vatican Banker Linked to Sindona Is Arrested,” The New York Times, February 6, 1981, A3; Raw, The Moneychangers, 316.
122 John Hooper, “Luigi Mennini: Shadow over the Vatican,” The Guardian, August 14, 1997, 14.
123 Forty days in jail according to Paul Hoffman, Anatomy of the Vatican, 195; Raw, The Moneychangers, 316; As for Mennini released without any charges, see “Vatican Banker to Stand Trial in Sindona Case,” International News, Rome, P.M. cycle, July 22, 1982.
124 Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 64.
125 Gelli maintained an office at the Arezzo office of the textile firm, Giole, in Castiglion Fibocchi, Simoni and Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 130.
126 Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 51.
127 Rupert Cornwell, God’s Banker, 134.
128 Lernoux, In Banks We Trust, 179; Craig Unger, “The War They Wanted, the Lies They Needed,” Vanity Fair, July 2006; see also Tosches, Power on Earth, 238.
129 Simoni and Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 130, citing Massimo Teodori, Commissione parlamentare d’inchiesta sul caso Sindona, Relazione di minoranza (Minority Report of the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry on the Case and Sindona Report), Rome, April 15, 1982, 550ss.
130 Warrant subsequently executed on Michele Sindona, cited in Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 67; Cornwell, God’s Banker, 134.
131 A Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into P2 was established on September 23, 1981, and finished its work on July 12, 1984. Its final report was published as Dossier P2 in 2008 by Kaos Publishing in Milan.
132 See generally A. Barbieri, E. Scalfari, G.Turani, and N. Pagani, L’Italia della P2 (Milan: Mondadori Editore, 1981); Gianfranco Piazzesi, Gelli: La carriere di un eroe di questa Italia (Milan: Garzanti, 1983).
133 Vanni Nisticò quoted in L’Espresso, July 6, 1981, cited in Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 51. Father Lorenzo Zorza, a New York priest with whom the author spoke, was a close friend of Francesco Pazienza, an Italian intelligence agent and Calvi confidant. Zorza had seen and was familiar with the photo of the naked Pontiff. “It was obtained by Gelli,” Zorza told the author. “In part to show his power.” Interview with Father Lorenzo Zorza, September 6, 2013.
134 Raw, The Moneychangers, 299, 320–21.
135 Ortolani was also a Catholic nobleman who once served as the Knights of Malta ambassador to Uruguay. The Grand Military Order of the Knights of Malta is a Catholic order and recognizes the Pope’s authority over all its members. It also has sovereign diplomatic relations with over one hundred countries, including, among others, Spain, Italy, Russia, Austria, Egypt, Brazil. The Knights of Malta has a fully accredited ambassador to the European Union. Since 1994 it is a permanent observer at the United Nations. Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It, 16. See also ww.orderofmalta.int
136 Philip Pullella, “Italian Government Collapses over Masonic Scandal,” UPI, International News, Rome, A.M. cycle, May 26, 1981; see also Cornwell, God’s Banker, 46–47.
137 Louise Branson, “Italian Masonic Leader Arrested at Swiss Bank,” UPI, International News, Geneva, P.M. cycle, September 14, 1982; Tanner, “Italian Elite Embroiled in a Scandal.”
138 Also included on the list besides Marcinkus was an IOR monsignor, Donato de Bonis, and also Secretary of State Villot and Foreign Minister Casaroli. See Nuzzi, Vaticano S.p.A., 17; Willan, The Last Supper, 121; Raw, The Moneychangers, 145. As for Freemasonry inside the Vatican, Marcinkus said, “there is no such thing. Promise. I swear it.” Handwritten notes by Philip Willan of audiotaped interviews between John Cornwell and Marcinkus, February 8, 1988, 8b, 9a, provided to author courtesy of Willan. Pope John Paul II later eliminated excommunication as a punishment for being a Freemason, although technically membership remained incompatible with church dogma. See Nuzzi, Vaticano S.p.A., 26 and 29, n. 14.
139 Paddy Agnew, “Andreotti Verdict Welcomed by Right and the Vatican,” The Irish Times, October 25, 1999, 9.
Chapter 23: “You Have to Kill the Pope”
1 Henry Tanner, “2 Bullets Hit Pontiff,” The New York Times, May 14, 1981, A1.
2 The Pope believed that the Virgin Mary had interceded to save him, part of what he later called a “divine call.” Hebblethwaite, Pope John Paul II and the Church, 94.
3 “Bulgaria and the Pope,” The MacNeil/Lehrer Report, transcript, January 5, 1983. The day after Ağca had killed the Turkish editor, he mailed letters to the dead man’s newspaper warning that if the Pope visited Turkey, he would kill the “Crusader Commander.” Koehler, Spies in the Vatican, 115. See generally Paul Henze, The Plot to Kill the Pope (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1983).
4 Wendy Owen, “Agca Wasn’t the Only One Who Said There Was a Plot,” Associated Press, International News, Rome, A.M. cycle, March 29, 1986.
5 “Bulgaria and the Pope,” The MacNeil/Lehrer Report.
6 Owen, “Agca Wasn’t the Only One Who Said There Was a Plot.” Two years later the Bulgarian government, still stinging from the charges it was behind the plot to kill the Pope, published a report that concluded it was highly likely that John Paul I had been poisoned in 1978. The Bulgarians said John Paul had been murdered by Vatican insiders intent on preventing him from overhauling the Curia. “Bulgaria Suggests John Paul I was Poisoned,” UPI, International News, A.M. cycle, Vienna, February 4, 1983.
7 “Bulgaria and the Pope,” The MacNeil/Lehrer Report.
8 Koehler, Spies in the Vatican, 117–19, 127.
9 See Willan, The Last Supper, 279–81; Thomas and Morgan-Witts, Pontiff, 331; Abdul Alim, “Khomeni himself asked me to kill the Pope,” The Muslim Times, February 2, 2013.
10 Vladimir Zhirinovsky quoted in “Russia’s Zhirinovskiy Tries to Justify Attempt on Polish Pope’s Life,” BBC Monitoring Former Soviet Union—Political, Supplied by BBC Worldwide Monitoring, January 12, 2006; see also Matthew Day, “CIA ‘Framed Bulgaria’ for Shooting Pope John Paul II,” The Daily Telegraph, April 22, 2011, Edition 3, 20.
11 Victor L. Simpson, “Close Encounters with St. Peter’s Successors on Papal Plane and Behind Vatican’s Bronze Doors,” Postmedia Breaking News, Associated Press, February 27, 2013.
12 George Brodzki, “Strikers Reportedly Form Unified Committee,” International News, A.M. cycle, Gdańsk, Poland, Associated Press, August 17, 1980.
13 Carl Bernstein and Marco Politi, His Holiness: John Paul II and the History of Our Time (New York: Penguin, 1996), 231, 244–47. See generally Jack M. Bloom, “The Solidarity Revolution in Poland, 1980–1981,” The Oral History Review 33, no. 1 (Winter/Spring, 2006), published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Oral History Association, 33–64; Gregory F. Domber, “The AFL-CIO, the Reagan Administration and Solidarność,” The Polish R
eview 52, no. 3 (2007), published by the University of Illinois Press on behalf of the Polish Institute of Arts & Sciences of America, 277–304.
14 Thomas and Morgan-Witts, Pontiff, 406–7.
15 Owen, “Agca Wasn’t the Only One Who Said There Was a Plot”; “Bulgaria and the Pope,” The MacNeil/Lehrer Report.
16 Wojciech Adamiecki, the editor of the underground Solidarity newspapers, interviewed by Carl Bernstein, “The Holy Alliance,” Time, February 24, 1992. “We were told the Pope had warned the Soviets that if they entered Poland he would fly to Poland and stay with the Polish people. The church was of primary assistance.”
17 Agostino Bono, “Officials Say Pope, Reagan Shared Cold War Data, but Lacked Alliance,” Catholic News Service, November 17, 2004, 31.
18 Bernstein and Politi, His Holiness, 267. The KGB was aware of the White House relationship with Krol. See generally Koehler, Spies in the Vatican, 97–98.
19 Laghi always used a southwest gate so he could avoid reporters. “By keeping in such close touch, we did not cross lines. My role was primarily to facilitate meetings between Walters and the Holy Father. The Holy Father knew his people. It was a very complex situation.” Bernstein, “The Holy Alliance.”
20 Bernstein and Politi, His Holiness, 269; see also Koehler, Spies in the Vatican, 188, n. 6.
21 Author interview with Michael Hornblow, January 28, 2014.
22 Ibid.
23 Koehler, Spies in the Vatican, 187.
24 Ronald Reagan interviewed in Bernstein, “The Holy Alliance.”
25 Author interview with William P. Clark, September 15, 2005. That same year, 1984, the Reagan administration announced at the World Conference on Population in Mexico City that it was reversing America’s many years of commitment to international family planning and withdrew funding from the United Nations Fund for Population Activities as well as the International Planned Parenthood Federation. The quid pro quo between the U.S. and the Vatican seemed to continue when Reagan introduced a new generation of more powerful cruise missiles into Europe, and the normally pacifist Papacy did not object. Domestically, the president had proposed tuition tax credits for private schools, introducing the idea in a speech before the National Catholic Educational Association. That led to decades of mostly unsuccessful court challenges by opponents who argued it violated the Constitution’s separation of church and state.
God's Bankers: A History of Money and Power at the Vatican Page 98