Vatileaks: Police Reveals Butler Stole Documents Pope Intended to Destroy

By Giacomo Galeazzi
Vatican Insider
October 3, 2012

http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/homepage/the-vatican/detail/articolo/vatileaks-vaticano-vatican-18620/

The trial continues

Today was the third hearing of the Paolo Gabriele case. During today's testimonies, descriptions were given of the seized letters and books which the Pope's former butler had kept in paper and digital format

The poison pen letter writer's strange 007-style archive. Letters from politicians, correspondence between cardinals and the Pope and documents on freemasonry and secret services. When Paolo Gabriele's house was searched on 23 May, for the leaked Vatican documents, the hunt extended to the children's rooms as well. As the search dragged on and Gabriele had decided not to send his family away, the commander of the Vatican Gendarmerie, Domenico Giani, issued an order for the search in the children's rooms to be speeded up so as to protect them as afar as possible and allow them to sleep.

On the third day of the butler's trial, the four Vatican policemen who were heard in court, provided information on the scene where they discovered the poison pen letter writer's dossier. Two of the m in particular - Silvano Carli and Luca Bassetti - arrived on the scene when the house search was already underway, especially to look through the children's rooms. The policemen said that Gabriele offered them coffee during the search and then said to them: "It's a pity you'll be finish here late tonight, as you can see I like reading and writing."

Eighty two crates of seized material were taken from the former butler's house, plus two leather briefcases and two yellow folders full of letters. "Paolo Gabriele thanked us again and again for the humane attitude shown throughout the investigation."

The deputy police chief of the Vatican Gendarmerie, Luca Cintia, was keen to have these comments minuted during today's hearing of the unfaithful papal butler case. Recalling yesterday's decision to open an inquiry into alleged mistreatment and abuses suffered by the defendant while he was being held in the Vatican Gendarmerie prison, the President of the Vatican Tribunal, Giuseppe Dalla Torre, warned him,: "There is an open case file on this, be careful what you say."

Paolo Gabriele responded with a nod, confirming Cintia's statement. The originals and photocopied versions of the confidential letters belonging to the Pope and the Holy See were found amongst the "hundreds of thousands of documents" found in Paolo Gabriele's house during the search carried out by the Vatican Gendarmerie, just before the papal butler's arrest.

In the testimonies given during the third hearing today, members of the Corps of Gendarmerie, Stefano De Santis, Silvano Carli, Luca Bassetti and Luca Cintia explained that there were "more than a thousand" documents that were "crucial" to the investigations, i.e. originals and photocopies of documents signed by the Pope or addressed to him by cardinals and "politicians". Some of these are "highly confidential" because they bear the Pope's handwriting marking them "to be destroyed". The number of vital documents found was far greater than those published by Italian journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi in his book "Sua Santità" ("His Holiness"). But these were "well hidden" as they were "mixed in with thousands of other letters" to do with studies and texts on "Masonry, esoterism, the P2 and P4 Masonic Lodges, secret services, the Bisignani and Calvi cases, the Vatican bank (IOR), the AIF and Berlusconi," the Vatican police said. But there were also texts about "Christianity and yoga, Christianity and other religions, yoga and Buddhism and other material which was presumably to do with Gabrieles' children's schooling and studies.

Other material is to do with "how to hide jpeg and Word files, how to record and make videos and how to secretly use a cell phone." The documents that were seized, filling up 82 cardboard removal boxes measuring 50-60cm by 50cm, "two black leather briefcases and two large yellow folders" were found on the living room bookcase and in the a cupboard in Gabriele's study. A substantial amount of computer hardware was also seized from the former butler's home: one desktop computer, "two or three laptops," "numerous USB keys," two hard disks, various memory cards, a Playstation and an iPad. All this material will be relevant in computer technician Claudio Sciarpelletti's brief trial. "It's going to be interesting", De Santis, one of the witnesses, commented during the hearing. To the various types of confidential documents seized from Paolo Gabriele, De Santis added those documents "which concern the Holy Father (some of which carry the Pope's signature), the Secretariat of State, the Vatican Congregations and the Pontifical Councils. Some of these are to do with the Pope's "total privacy and family life" and other "highly confidential" documents written in German and marked "to be destroyed." The fourth hearing will be held Saturday, when it is highly likely a sentence will be pronounced.