Did A Vatican Official Offer A Prostitute As Thanksgiving?

Southwark Crown Court judge Tony Baumgartner, England, blasted Vatican prosecutors for making “appalling misrepresentations," and reversed a seizure of the British bank accounts of Gianluigi Torzi, a broker for the Vatican involved in the London property deal.

According to AP.org (March 25), Baumgartner called the Vatican’s seizure request "full of omissions." Vatican prosecutors have already faced a series of setbacks in foreign courts because of incompetence, overreach, and basic problems such as properly translating documents. After nearly two years, no one has been indicted.

Torzi who denies any wrongdoing, is accused of embezzlement and fraud but the payments he received were approved by Vatican officials through signed contracts which according to Baumgartner "speak for themselves.”

Baumgartner doubts that Cardinal Parolin and Archbishop Peña were “astonished” [= "knew nothing"] about Torzi’s fees. In that case, they “must have had the wool pulled completely over their eyes,” Baumgartner observed.

The ruling included Torzi’s assertion that a Vatican representative offered him “the services of a prostitute to thank him for his work.” Torzi said he declined the offer.

Picture: © Pietro Parolin, CC BY-NC-ND, #newsScrfaogldy