Relics and militants: Vatican fraud trial sprawls the globe

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican’s financial trial took a series of surreal turns Thursday when a former suspect-turned-star witness was thrown out of the tribunal and a defendant asserted in court documents that she escorted two emissaries of Russian President Vladimir Putin into the Holy See to negotiate the return of holy relics to the Russian Orthodox Church.

The developments turned an otherwise mundane cross-examination of a onetime Vatican power broker about the Vatican's investment strategies into an unexpected drama. It underscored the peculiarity of the trial and the remarkable situation the Holy See found itself in after entrusting delicate diplomatic, financial and intelligence work to outsiders who who got in the door by impressing a cardinal.

The trial originated in the Holy See’s 350 million euro investment in a London real estate deal, but it has expanded to include other alleged crimes. Vatican prosecutors have accused 10 people of fraud, embezzlement and abuse of office, and some of extorting the Vatican of 15 million euros to get control of the London building.

One of the original prime suspects in the London deal, Monsignor Alberto Perlasca, turned into the prosecution’s star witness after he flipped and started revealing all that he knew about other defendants. He is now asserting that he is a victim of the crime and entitled to damages, and showed up unannounced at the tribunal Thursday only to be thrown out by the chief judge.

Also Thursday, lawyers for defendant Cecilia Marogna filed a personal statement in which she explained her intelligence work on behalf of the Holy See in terms that read more like a James Bond job description. She said her work included contacts with Russian emissaries, meetings with Italian intelligence agents, and regular updates with the secret service chiefs of...