Let us examine the possibility he was attacked while sleeping. There were no locks on any of the doors in the Papal Apartment. Anyone eluding the guard at its entrance and gaining access to the apartment had free access to the Pope’s bedroom.
Lethal injection of a hostile victim requires a minimum of two people—one to hold the victim and the other to make the injection. This would be true whether he was awake or sleeping.
The ‘torn sleeves’ is consistent with either hypothesis—if he had been awake and dressed in daytime clothes or if he had been asleep in his bedclothes. If he had been in his bedclothes, he would have had to have been redressed in his daytime clothes. One is not likely to tear a sleeve when dressing oneself, yet, this can often occur when pulling clothes onto a rigid body, particularly delicate pope sleeves.
Why would the killers dress him in his daytime clothes?
The answer could have been to place the time of death after he retired the previous evening sometime before midnight. This would support the early morning embalming. This would be true only if Cardinal Villot who ordered the early embalming had been involved.
Yet, it is more likely they would have dressed him in his daytime clothes to give the impression he had risen at his usual time, turned off the alarm, turned on the light, completed his toilet, dressed for the day, and sat himself up in bed reading while he waited for the coffee knock—just as the nun who found him had assumed.
The Catholic world believes the police and crowds who roam the square at night and those who lived in surrounding buildings had not noticed the light had been on all night “by the grace of God.”
It believes scores of early risers in the surrounding buildings who told the press the pope’s light came on at its usual time, lied.
That he was wearing his glasses points to someone who did not know he did not require them to read—a professional killer. That they disappeared suggests an accomplice—an insider involved in a conspiracy. Someone who came to the room—realizing a mistake had been made—confiscated them. According to all those brought to his room, including both Vatican releases, the Pope was wearing his glasses. Yet, by the time the embalmers took charge they were gone.
We have resolved Lorenzi took the papers from his hands. Could it be he took the glasses at the same time? One will never know.
The watch
Finally, we have the watch he had been fumbling with at dinner. “It was of such an unusual design, it looked like it had come out of ‘Dr No.’”13 The watch, no one knew where it came from.
There is the possibility it had been set for the time of death. A spring mechanism released a needle at the wrist and instant death.
The CIA has a unit that does nothing but develop contraptions of this sort. One does not have to depend on ‘Dr No.’
This may have left the body in the position it was found. One could say if it had been set for a few minutes before the nun showed up with coffee, it could explain why he was in his daytime clothes.
Yet, the watch, at most, could have rendered him immobile to facilitate the killers’ transgression. It could have never done the job by itself. For it could have never placed the glasses on his nose.
Unless, of course, it did come out of ‘Dr No.’
Final tally
When all is said and done, it is reasonable to conclude the Pope was killed by lethal injection shortly before four o’clock in the morning and at least two people were involved in the evil deed—people who did not know he did not require his glasses to read.
One hears many stories. One hears, on the one hand, there was no embalming—the nuns, Magee and Lorenzi readied the body for viewing at noon, going so far as to place the jaw in a sling to correct twisted features to suggest heart attack. If true, they did a good job. Six hundred thousand mourners passed by the body on an open catafalque and not one of them noticed a contorted face at all.
On the other hand, Vatican motor pool records show a van was dispatched at 5:23AM on the morning of September 29, 1978 to pick up the Signoracci brothers from the nearby school of medicine.21
In addition, Mario de Francesco who interviewed the embalmers and the embalmers, themselves, have never changed their story in the press, ‘He had not been dead for more than an hour or two.’22
We may never know who placed the spectacles on the man who did not need them to read? Who turned the light on which was not on all night? Who turned the alarm clock off which did not ring? Who dressed him in his daytime clothes? Who gave him the watch which ticked the time of death? Then again, was the watch set for the time of death? Who took the scorpions, the spectacles, the slipper socks and the watch? Who took the time to methodically destroy all nine copies of his will?
Yet, one thing we do know. It was not John Paul. For he would have never placed the glasses on his nose.
This good man was killed by lethal injection administered by paid professional killers. Yet, how did they gain access to the Pope that night without passing by the guard?
More importantly, who called the shot? His enemies inside the Vatican? His enemies across the pond? A combination of these?
We will prove these things in what is yet to come.
Yet, we will never know who called the shot in Vincenza’s case. Her witness in David Yallop’s ‘In God’s Name’ is most critical to his conclusion the pope was murdered
Had she been alive in 1987, and, unlike Magee, Lorenzi, the embalmers and others, not been persuaded to change her testimony, John Cornwell could have never written his book.
David Yallop’s ‘In God’s Name’ was published on June 1, 1984. Within a week the world learned a pope had been murdered.
Vincenza was the leading lady on Yallop’s stage. Reporters were lining up to reap the scoop of the century. Yet, she was not there.
Sister Vincenza Taffarel was found dead in her bed as the cock crowed in the wee hours of the morning of June 17, 1984.23
Nevertheless, before we go on, let me tell you of what became of Jack. Yes, whatever became of my good friend Jack?
1 Composite of Vatican wire release, La Osservatore Romano and Vatican Radio 29 Sep 78
2 ANSA Mario di Francesco’s interview with the embalmers—the Signoracci brothers 29 Sep 78
3 Vatican Radio 10 Oct 78 A composite of what was announced by Vatican Radio and what was published in La Osservatore Romano is used to describe the corrected release of 10 Oct 78
4 Medical dictionaries dated after 2000 or search Internet: ‘heart attack stroke blood pressure”
5 Messaggero Mestre 14 Oct 78
6 Lorenzi gave this testimony to reporters after Cornwell wrote his book in 1987 to help the Vatican refute Yallop’s 1984 proof the Pope had been murdered. One has to wonder why he waited nine years to give this very critical testimony. See www.johnpaul1.org for film clip of Lorenzi’s press report. Lorenzi was 39 when the Pope died. He is obviously in his 50s in the film. Lorenzi does qualify his claim of ‘pain in Cornwell’s book, “I am a member of the Don Orione Brothers who take a vow of special allegiance to the sitting Pontiff, I do anything I am told.”
7 Lorenzi claims ‘chest pain’ (heart attack), Magee claims ‘choking pain’ (pulmonary embolism). Magee hints the pope was taking anticoagulants. Not true per Dr. Da Ros, “I was astounded when I heard them make these affirmations” Il Giornale Andrea Tornelli 27 Sep 03. This is confirmed by Dr. Rama, the doctor who had treated him for his retina in 1975, “His viscosity was normal. There was no need for anticoagulants. The condition was alleviated by mild medication relaxing the blood vessels.”
8 Even at the time it was known a massive pulmonary embolus could not form without the patient being aware of it. She cleverly only ‘alludes’ the pope was being treated for a clotting problem. If he had been treated for such a problem, she surely would have known of it and told us so.
9 Mosby’s Dictionary of Medicine or any AMA approved medical dictionary dated after 2000.
10 JAMA Jul 94 ‘Pulmonary Eyebolus?’ British
Medical Journal Aug 99 ’Keep an Eye on the Brain.’
11 Medical dictionaries dated before 1980: ‘heart attack stroke blood pressure”
12 reprinted from A Thief in the Night John Cornwell 1987
13 ANSA News Service 30 Sep 78 ‘Sister Vincenza’
14 Messaggero Mestre 14 Oct 78
15 Il Giornale Andrea Tornelli 27 Sep 03
16 La Stampa 5 Sep 78
17 La Repubblica 1 Oct 78
18 La Repubblica 2 Sep 78
19 Deadly Doses Serita Stevens or search Internet or libraries: ‘poisons’
20 Catholic Encyclopedia Second Edition
21 La Stampa 2 Nov 78. Motor pool records showed a van released to pick up embalmers at 5:23AM
22 ANSA Mario di Francesco’s interview with the embalmers—the Signoracci brothers 29 Sep 78
23 La Repubblica 18 Jun 84. Cause of death was not released. Yallop’s interview with Vincenza in his book In God’s Name is among the most compelling testimony the Pope was murdered.
Chapter 26
The Murder of Jack Champney
Jack went from the mountain diocese to Milan where he served under Cardinal Colombo until 1975 when he was moved to the Vatican and assigned to the council which examined spiritual events.
When Luciani was raised to the papacy, Jack was assigned the task of quelling uncertainties of those Curia cardinals expected to lose their jobs.
On the second day following John Paul’s death, a small notice appeared in a Rome newspaper. Its translation,
“The body of a hit-run victim dressed in a yellow shirt, tan shorts and white bucks was found on the Viale Vaticano near the Vatican Museum entrance this morning. Police are looking for witnesses of the incident and someone to identify the man who is believed to be an American tourist in his thirties.”
…halfway between a Silver Star and a Purple Heart
As I drove into the funeral home parking lot, I thought of my last visit with Jack, one of the few times I had seen him since the day he had stood at the pinnacle of secondary school life rendering the coveted address on graduation day. Perhaps, he should have used the words Lincoln had used so modestly at Gettysburg, “… the world will little note, nor long remember what is said here …” Unlike Lincoln, Jack would have been telling the truth.
I thought of Jack’s letter in which he had told me of John Paul’s talk with the Curia cardinals just a week earlier, ‘…Mother Church will cease to be the cause of many of the world’s problems and rather will begin to be the answer to them.’
As I stood before him, I couldn’t see him, for the mutilation had been much too terrible to allow the body to be viewed. As I began to realize he was now still, I recalled what he once was and I prayed he had had time to have completed his work. At the same time, I thought of Piccolo and I knew he had not had time to complete his work—which has caused me to write this book.
As I reached over and lay my hand on the lid of the coffin just above his heart to confirm to myself this was forever goodbye, a tear came up out of my heart and started from the crevice of my eye and crept toward the lid. I glanced, first, to the right, then to the left, and, again, to the right, and, finally, to the left, once more. I held it there hovering on the edge of the cliff.
Turning to the audience, a wave of applause moved forward in muffled cries, in sighs of desperation and hopeless sobs. I went to the one who sat in the front row and introduced myself and told her of a part of my life which had been a part of her son’s life.
She reached into her purse and brought forth a small package. Placing it in my hand, “Jack told me if anything was to happen to him he wanted you to have this. We gave it to him for his ordination, the most important day of his life.”
Later in the funeral home parking lot, I looked at the package.
It was postmarked Centrale Poste de Roma and dated a few days before the Pope’s death. As it had never been opened, Jack had undoubtedly called his mother sometime between then and now.
I was puzzled it was not postmarked Poste Citta del Vaticano, as had been true of his correspondence to me since he had been in the Vatican. I unwrapped it and opening a small box, I found it was six o’clock, exactly halfway between a Silver Star and a Purple Heart.
A strange coincidence
A couple of weeks after Jack’s funeral, a package arrived in the mail. It, too, was strangely postmarked from the Centrale Poste de Roma. There was a note bearing the letterhead, L’ufficio della Segreteria di Stato Vaticano. It was signed by Jean Villot.
Enclosed was the above news clipping and a small booklet black pockmarked leather and engraved in gold, ‘The Vatican, 1978.’
There is nothing of great interest—a daily reminder. There was one meeting with Cardinal Confalonieri, the longest reigned cardinal and, therefore, Dean of the College. There were one, two, three meetings with Agostino Casaroli. There had been another with Jean Villot who had been good enough to have sent me the notebook.
Jack also had a meeting in Genoa with Cardinal Siri. There was a notation Casaroli and Caprio had attended the same meeting. It struck me as odd two bishops would travel two hundred miles to meet with a man of the rank of a simple priest, when they could have met with him anytime in Rome by just walking down the hall.
A second notation cleared the matter up. Jack had run into Cardinal Wojtyla, the Archbishop of Krakow, who was exiting the cardinal’s palace as he arrived. Casaroli and Caprio had traveled to Genoa to meet with Wojtyla. It was coincidental with Jack’s visit.
Yet, I wondered what could be so important that would cause the Polish cardinal to journey seven hundred miles back to Italy to meet these men when just two weeks before he had spent ten days with them at the conclave that had elected John Paul?
I assume they were meeting to plan the strategy as to how the conservative right was going to survive under the liberal papacy of John Paul. Or, perhaps, they were just planning the next conclave.
In retrospect, there would be nothing wrong with leaders of the conservative right to plan the strategy for the next conclave just as there would be nothing wrong for the leaders of the progressive left to plan strategy for the next conclave.
What was unusual about this meeting, if it was indeed held to discuss strategy of the next conclave, is that the reigning pontiff was still alive. As a matter-of-fact, no one would have guessed—no, not in a million years—John Paul would be dead in three weeks time.
Yet, there is nothing in the press to link this gathering to a conspiracy to murder John Paul. Also, the particulars of a conspiracy can be handled by phone and other means, it is not necessary to meet face to face. Also, these men were friends, and may have been doing not much more than vacationing together.
The last item in the booklet was dated the day John Paul was found dead. It was addressed to me, most likely why Villot had mailed the booklet to me as he had circled it in red.
“Lucien, His brother Edoardo. It was no accident. It was murder.”
This would haunt me for years. John Paul’s demise had never been considered an accident and his brother Edoardo was very much alive. In fact, shortly after John Paul’s death, I had been granted an interview with Edoardo Luciani for a fee of only two hundred bucks.
1 Other than of an Italian newspaper, source is unknown. The clipping was in the Villot package
Chapter 27
Motive and Opportunity
“Sadly, Giovanni, when we have finally finished our work, and everyone has enough, there will always be those who want too much!”
Albino Luciani
This past summer, as I had done so many times before, I traced my patron from the village of Canale d’Agordo to Belluno, then on to Vittorio Veneto, then on to Venice and, finally, on to Rome.
I carried in my hand a copy of Murder in the Vatican.
No matter where I was, in a park, in a pub, in a store, in a coffeehouse, I was approached by Italians. Each one laughed, “You’re not telling us anything we don�
�t already know.”
It is a rare Italian who doesn’t know John Paul was murdered. What’s more, they didn’t have to wait six years for David Yallop’s In God’s Name to tell them. The events of the time did that for them. Yet, their commonality ended there.
Those in the liberal north claimed he had been murdered for ecclesiastical reasons. He would fuel the emerging social evolution of contraception, feminism, genetic research, ecumenism, divorce and remarriage, single parenthood and even gay liberation.
Yet, in conservative Rome most were of another opinion. They believed he was murdered to protect the regency of the papacy, something they agreed with and therefore looked the other way. The Roman prefers not to give up his king.
John Paul would not only shed his regal robes and the Vatican treasures but would annihilate much of the ritual of the Church. He would pull them up off their knees chanting vain repetitions to their gods and put them to work helping others—a threat to those who really believed they could walk to heaven on their knees.
In any event, most Italians thought the perpetrators came from inside the Vatican.
Across the pond
Few Italians recognized the murders of Aldo Moro, Paul VI and John Paul I—in rapid consecutive order as if a machine gun had mowed them down—had brought an abrupt end to what until then had been the rising success of communism in Europe.
There is the old adage when one is in the forest ‘one cannot see the forest for the trees.’ The people of Italy had been at the heart of the communist movement in Europe. A movement which at the time threatened the stability not only of Europe and Latin America but the capitalistic world the United States and Britain thrived in. Could it be few Italians considered the order may have come from the other side of the pond because ‘one cannot see the forest for the trees?’
Regardless, in the case of murder, one must first consider motive, for this is the most basic requirement of murder. In fact, it is the only absolute requirement of murder. What’s more, it is the most telltale evidence of murder. Once the super sleuth determines ‘why’ one was murdered, one has the murderer. Does one not?
Murder in the Vatican Page 31