Four people including former Vatileaks
defendant Francesca Immacolata Chaouqui have been placed under
investigation in a probe into contracts worth some 72 million
euros to buy 801 million facemasks from China during the first
wave of the pandemic, Rome prosecutors said Friday.
Possible charges include influence peddling and receiving stolen
goods, they said.
The others probed are an engineer, Andrea Vincenzo Tommasi, the
head of a firm at the centre of the probe; Mario Benotti, a
journalist currently on leave of absence; and an official,
Antonella Appulo.
Former PR expert Chaouqui was found guilty in the "Vatileaks 2"
trial over leaked Vatican financial documents and got a
suspended term of 10 months.
She wrote a book about her experience.
In the book, titled "Nel nome di Pietro" (In The Name of
Peter), Chaouqui tells of her time as a member on the
now-defunct COSEA commission set up to advise Pope Francis on
the reform of the Holy See's economic and administrative
structure, and of her work alongside Mons. Vallejo Balda, who
was also found guilty in the trial and sentenced to 18 months in
jail.
During the trial, Balda admitted leaking confidential
documents to journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi, who wrote a book called
"Merchants in the Temple" (Via Crucis in the Italian version).
The prelate also spoke of "exchanging" documents with
journalist Emiliano Fittipaldi, who wrote a book called
"Avarice".
Both books detailed waste, mismanagement and excessive expenses
racked up by Vatican officials.
In Chaouqui's book, she includes a series of documents from her
work with the COSEA commission, and also tells of a letter she
wrote to Pope Francis asking permission to be relieved from her
responsibility of keeping Vatican state secrets to be able to
tell "everything" at trial - a letter to which the pope
didn't respond.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
