THE BUTLER DID NOT DO IT



A tell-all book, leaked documents, billions in favorable contracts, money laundering, sexual terrorism ... and possibly murder. With St. Peter's in the background, it all sounds like a Dan Brown thriller. But in this mystery, the butler did not do it. At least not to the extent that a papal investigation would have it.



Paolo Gabriele, 46, who has worked as Benedict's butler since 2006, was reportedly taken into custody after investigators found a mass of documents in the Vatican apartment he shares with his wife and three children.

The arrest comes a month after the Vatican gave an investigative team led by Cardinal Julian Herranz, a member of Opus dei, a full "pontifical mandate" to join Vatican police in rooting out the perpetrators of what has been dubbed Vatileaks.

Gabriele is now languishing in a Vatican prison cell (yes, the Vatican does have a prison) and for now it seems that his only crime was the same as that of Pvt. Bradley Manning (wikileaks) - leaking the juiciest anti-Vatican documents in history.

Sources close to Gabriele, however, say that he would not have masterminded a leak and that his possession of the documents proves very little: no motive has been proffered and apparently no money was offered for the documents.



MONEY FIRST



The documents show how contracts were awarded to favoured companies and individuals and also highlight allegations of internal power struggles with the Vatican's bank known as the Institute for Religious Works.

In a chaotic mire of firings, leaked documents and sordid stories, one thing stands out: an attempt at looking transparent has failed. From Yahoo News :

The Vatican in July will learn if it has complied with the financial transparency criteria of a Council of Europe committee, Moneyval -- a key step in its efforts to get on the so-called "white list" of countries that share financial information to fight tax evasion.

As was reported in OpEdNews last October, the Vatican issued a statement entitled: TOWARDS REFORMING THE INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL AND MONETARY SYSTEMS IN THE CONTEXT OF GLOBAL PUBLIC AUTHORITY . The gist of the memo endeared the Vatican to the hearts of the OWS movement, but was seen by many to be just another attempt to gloss over the latest money-laundering scandal (fined $30 million by the Italian government).

HIS HOLINESS - One Helluva Read



The book, which was described as criminal by the Vatican, alleged that the editor of the Vatican's newspaper started a gay smear campaign against a rival editor, with the help of a newspaper owned by the Berlusconi family.

Letters depict collusion between the Berlusconi government and the Vatican over how to avoid EU pressure to make the Catholic church pay tax on its properties.

With previously leaked documents, journalist Gianluihi Nuzzi wrote a book in 2009 entitled Vatican SpA, and his latest work, His Holiness, uses even more, including some of the documents found in the home of Gabriele. In it, "hypocrisy within the Vatican goes unchallenged and scandals multiply", in-fighting, smear campaigns and the pope's personal correspondence with the head of the Vatican bank, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi all highlight the almost innate corruption holding sway in the Vatican for years.

MURDERS IN THE RUE VATICANE

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