A ruling by the High Court of England and Wales published Feb. 21 has confirmed that the Vatican Secretariat of State was deceived by Italian financier Raffaele Mincione in the irregular purchase of a London building.
For this transaction that ended in fraud Mincione was sentenced in December 2023 by a Vatican lower court to five years and six months in prison for financial crimes related to the case.
In addition, he was ordered to forfeit 200.5 million euros (about $210 million), one of the largest financial penalties ever imposed in the Vatican courts.
In that trial, Cardinal Angelo Becciu was also sentenced to five and a half years in prison for embezzlement of public funds.
According to the ruling, Becciu arranged the acquisition of property located on Sloane Avenue when he was deputy secretary of state from 2011 to 2018.
To do so, he used a third of the reserved funds of the Secretariat of State: that is, $200 million that was paid between 2013 and 2014 at the request of Becciu.
This amount was used to buy shares through a fund managed by the Italian intermediary Mincione, who was also convicted along with Becciu by the Vatican lower court for money laundering, embezzlement, and corruption.
Following the sentence, Mincione filed a lawsuit against the Vatican Secretariat of State in British court in June 2020, and the court published its ruling Feb. 21.
The Italian financier’s aim was to obtain a series of legal declarations in his favor regarding his handling of the buying and selling of the Sloane Avenue building.
Mincione argued that his conduct in the transaction had been transparent and in accordance with the standards of good faith. However, the British court rejected his allegations, confirming that the Vatican had reasons to consider itself the victim of a damaging financial scheme.
According to Judge Robin Knowles’ 50-page ruling, Mincione and his companies withheld key information and misrepresented the value of the London property, causing significant harm to the Vatican.
The court found that Mincione made “unrealistic” statements, inflating the price of the property and taking advantage of the Vatican’s lack of experience in such investments.
Much of the lengthy summary of the verdict focuses on the reconstruction of the irregular transaction.The British court made it clear that the Vatican Secretariat of State was deceived, which coincides with the primary thesis of the Vatican court, which had previously convicted Mincione of money laundering, embezzlement, and corruption.
As a lower court ruling, Mincione has the possibility of appealing the decision.
For the Vatican, the ruling “has important implications not only for Mincione but also for future cases involving the financial operations of the Holy See,” according to a Vatican News editorial on the subject.
According to Vatican journalist Andrea Tornielli, the ruling “establishes an important precedent by recognizing that the Vatican was the victim of financial fraud in one of its most important real estate investments.”
He also confirmed that according to the Vatican “the lack of transparency and ethics with which Mincione and his entourage operated could influence other ongoing judicial proceedings.”
The sentence reinforces, Tornielli said, “the conclusions of the Vatican tribunal, which had already convicted Mincione for crimes related to fraudulent investments of funds of the Holy See.”
Tornielli also referenced a statement by the Vatican promoter of justice, Alessandro Diddi, expressing his satisfaction with the British court’s ruling against Mincione.
“The British judges have shared the view of the Vatican tribunal and have confirmed that Raffaele Mincione did not act in good faith as required in this type of transaction. With this ruling, it is clear that the Vatican court acted correctly in its assessment of the case,” Diddi said.
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
