VATICAN CITY
The Daily Beast
Barbie Latza Nadeau
An indictment published by the Vatican on Monday indicates that a computer technician may have protected the pope’s former butler, who stands accused of leaking papal documents.
The pope’s erstwhile butler—Paolo Gabriele—will not be pardoned, the Vatican said on Monday, and instead will face a three-judge Vatican tribunal for allegedly stealing papal documents and leaking them to an Italian journalist. Yet in a surprise twist, in a 60-page indictment, which the Holy See published on Monday, the Vatican accused a second man–Claudio Sciarpelletti, a 48-year old computer technician–of aiding Gabriele by obstructing justice.
The two will be codefendants some time this fall. The date of the trial, which the Vatican says will be open to the press, will be set after September 20, when the Vatican’s judicial offices reopen following a summer recess, though a Vatican spokesman speculated that it will begin in October and last just a few days.
The surprise announcement in what’s known as the Vatileaks scandal underscores the Holy See’s ongoing ability to keep a secret, despite apparent fractures in the church’s once-impenetrable shield. For months, the Italian press has speculated that bishops, cardinals and nuns had served as Gabriele’s alleged accomplices. But no one had even heard of Sciarpelletti until Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi announced his alleged involvement at a press briefing on Monday.
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