VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Agency
Vatican City, Mar 14, 2016 / 05:37 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- During a Vatican City trial on Monday over a case in which five individuals are accused of leaking and disseminating confidential financial documents, a former Vatican official said he relayed documents only under duress.
“Yes, I passed documents,” Msgr. Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda, a former secretary of the Prefecture for Economic Affairs, told Vatican prosecutors March 14. “I was convinced I was in a situation without exit.”
Msgr. Vallejo claimed he felt trapped by “the powerful world behind” Francesca Chaouqui – another of the defendants in the trial.
Chaouqui, a public relations expert, was a member of a committee formed by Pope Francis in 2013 to help reform Vatican finances. The committee, COSEA, has since been dissolved.
The three other defendants are Nicola Maio, Msgr. Vallejo’s secretary, and the journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi.
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