SKULDUGGERY AT THE VATICAN
SKULDUGGERY AT THE VATICAN
People disappear all the time. Sometimes it's voluntary, other times it's a question of being at the wrong place at the wrong time.
But how could the wrong place be the Vatican, one of the world's holiest cities? Precisely because of its pious reputation, a series of unexplained disappearances that have occurred throughout the years, leads one to believe that dark deeds have indeed taken place.
The disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi on June 22, 1983 has produced various conspiracy theories of what happened to the 15-year old since the fateful day she left for music lessons.
Her father was a lay official in the Vatican, who organized papal functions, and the family lived inside the Vatican City.
Outwardly there was nothing different on the day she left for her lessons which she attended three timers per week in Rome. Then her sister received a call from Emanuela telling her she was late, because she had gone to an appointment to sign up to sell Avon cosmetics. Then Emanuela met with her friend, who said she saw her climb into a dark, green-colored BMW at a bus stop. This was the last sighting of Emanuela.
Her parents became alarmed when she didn't return from her lesson. The authorities didn't take a report telling she had probably gone off with some friends. The hours ticked by, and there was no sign of the teenager, and her parents call the director of the music school. He told them she never came for her lesson, and that he had no other information he could offer them.
Within a couple of days the family placed ads in several newspapers begging for any information. They listed their phone number, and that's when the bizarre phone calls started.
Various people with different accents called, however there was a call on June 25 from a man who called himself "Pierluigi". He said he was 16 years old, and that he had been with his fiancée at the Piazza Navona where they met Emanuela. He said the girl introduced herself as "Barbarella" and that she had run away from home. She also mentioned selling Avon cosmetics.
As weird as the call sounded, Pierluigi seemed to know many details about Emanuela including that she was carrying her flute, and was wearing glasses she didn't like. All of this was true. He also mentioned the girl had recently cut her hair.
Three days later another man called. His name was Mario. He said he was the owner of a bar near the school Emanuela attended. He said a customer that resembled her came to his store, and introduced herself as "Barbara". Like Pierluigi's story, the girl said she had run away from home, but planned to return for her sister's wedding.
Thousands of posters with Emanuela's face were put up all over the city as her parent's desperation escalated. The pope himself pleaded for those responsible to let her go. The anonymous calls continued, but now they were more frequent and more menacing.
Another set of calls said she had been taken by terrorists, who wanted to exchange her for the release of Mehmet Ali Agca, a Turkish man who had attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981.
One of the callers had an American accent and was dubbed l'Americano. He was eloquent and continued with the message of exchanging Emanuela for the Turkish man, and demanded the Pope agree and the deal be completed in 20 days. He produced a recording of a voice that sounded like Emanuela. He said he would produce more evidence such as photocopies of her school ID, sheets of music and a handwritten note. L'Americano claimed that Pierluigi and Mario all belonged to the same terrorist organization that took the girl.
In total he made 16 calls that were traced to a public telephone booth. Despite the promise of the conversations, suddenly the authorities said there was no evidence to link the kidnapping of Emanuela and the assassination against the Pope.
On July 8, a man with a Middle Eastern accent called. He was not eloquent or persuasive like l'Americano, and said that Emanuela would be killed if their demands were not met. Again he gave a deadline of 20 days. The demand was refused and the case went cold until this day.
The authorities have followed several tips and leads, including sightings of Emanuela which left them exactly where they started at.
Some believe Emanuela was truly a victim of a terrorist organization called the Grey Wolves that wanted to free Agca. The Turk during a prison interview said that Emanuela was captured by the group, and taken to a cloistered convent where she was alive and well. However no evidence has ever surface to confirm this claim. In 2006, he published a letter in which he said that Emanuela, and Mirella Gregori who also disappeared in 1983, were both taken by the Grey Wolves in a bid to free him. Both women were safe and taken to a "royal palace" in Liechtenstein.
Agca was released in 2010, and in a televised interview he talked about more bizarre claims. He said the Vatican had hired him to assassinate the Pope, and that Orlando was kept prisoner by the Vatican. She was alive living in a nunnery in a Central European country.
None of his claims have ever proven to be true.
A pervading sentiment is that the Vatican had a hand in the disappearance of both Orlandi and Gregori, or at least interfered in the investigation at every turn.
In one version Emanuela was taken by the order of Archbishop Paul Marcinkus (1922-2006) who ran the Vatican Bank. The motive for this was that Ercole Orlandi, Emanuela's father had uncovered criminal activity. The archbishop seem to use his standing to avoid answering questions about the disappearance.
The bank connection would get even deeper and more bizarre in 2011. Antonio Mancini, a member of the Italian organized crime syndicate Banda della Magliana, claimed that the kidnapping of Orlandi had been an attempt by the mafia to get the Vatican to repay large amounts of money that had been borrowed from them.
Their were also links to the death of the banker Roberto Calvi, also known as “God’s Banker” due to his Vatican connections. Calvi was found hanging under Blackfriars Bridge in London in June 1982, his pockets stuffed with cash and precious stones. This was after what is believed to have been from a falling out with the mafia after a botched money laundering operation.
The mafia connection has persisted. In 2005, an anonymous caller to the Italian crime show Who Has Seen? suggested that the secret to solving the case lay in opening the tomb of the infamous gangster Enrico de Pedis. Supposedly he killed the girl as a favor to the vicar general of Rome at the time, Cardinal Ugo Poletti. The claim became more credible when the mobster’s former girlfriend admitted that he had told her he had killed Orlandi. Various anonymous callers would go on to bolster the theory that there was some clue to be found within De Pedis’ tomb.
Enrico De Pedis, also known as Renatino, was known as a rather charismatic gangster who led a vicious group known to have had a hand in a lucrative drug trade in Rome. This same gang had been plying the Vatican for money, and had been linked to the death of the banker Roberto Calvi, who reportedly had the police in their pocket. De Pedis was ambushed and gunned down by rival gang members in 1990, in the picturesque cobbled streets of an area known as Campo de’ Fiori. It was believed the mobster’s tomb might actually hold the body of Orlandi, which had never been found.
The De Pedis tomb is in itself an anomaly. First he was buried at the Opus Dei Basilica of Sant’Apollinare, close to Piazza Navona in the centre of Rome. This is a sacred burial site mostly reserved for only the most senior and prestigious of church officials. The burial of a criminal here was unheard of and a clear violation of cardinal law. Oddly it was sanctioned by Cardinal Poletti himself, because De Pedis had repented for his crimes, and had made large donations to the church and charities to help the poor.
The Vatican dragged its feet on opening the tomb until 2008. This is when De Pedis' former girlfriend came forth with the information that the late Archbishop Paul Marcinkus had a hand in hiring the gangster. This story along with the lack of cooperation in opening the tomb, reinforced rumors of a church cover-up. Poletti died in 1997, and couldn't say if this was true or not. After pressure from the public and Orlandi’s family, the Vatican opened up the tomb. And what a tomb it was.
De Pedis was not a humble man, because why else would he emblazon his name in diamonds estimated to have cost £12,000 on his tomb? Despite the gaudy exterior, it was only De Pedis’ corpse inside the tomb, dressed in a dark suit and tie and in rather remarkably good condition. There was no one inside it to keep him company, however scattered around the crypt were over 200 boxes of unidentified human bones. Whatever the authorities expected to find, this was not one of them. They searched for hidden vaults, and completed DNA analysis of the bones and found they dated back to pre-Napoleonic times. Emanuela was not found either inside or outside De Pedis' tomb.
A new theory was introduced as to what happened to Emanuela in September, 2017.
When the CIA, KGB, Cosa Nostra, the head of the Vatican Bank, the leader of the Banda della Magliana and Roberto Calvi the head of the Banco Ambrosiano have been mentioned as being connected to Emanuela Orlandi's disappearance, there's not much place else to go with conspiracy theories, unless your name is Father Gabriele Amorth, the Vatican's head exorcist who died in 2016.
In May 2012, Father Amorth claimed that Orlandi was kidnapped by a member of the Vatican gendarmerie and foreign diplomats, and forced into participating in sex parties. In the scheme of things, it sounds plausible.
Pietro Orlandi claims that Pope Francis told him that "Emanuela is in heaven", but he still believes his sister might be alive, and that whatever her fate was, he wants to know the truth of what happened. He has petitioned for access to a dossier supposedly held by the Vatican. The dossier was referenced in the last book written by Emiliano Fittipaldi titled Gli Impostori (The Imposters).
Fittipaldi, an author of several books on the Vatican published a passage that read:
Summary account of the expenses paid by the Vatican City State for activities relative to the citizen Emanuela Orlandi (Rome, January 14, 1968".) The date is that of Emanuela's birth. This was supposedly found in a 197-page dossier that indicated that Emanuela was alive until 1997, and the Vatican knew where she was and paid for her keep. The source was Cardinal Antonetti the head of the Administration of the Assets of the Apostolic See. There were details which described the Vatican's expense for activities carried out following the change of accommodation and successive phases of citizen Emanuela Orlandi.
There were bills and documents for lodgings dating from 1983 to 1997, at an address which is the headquarters of the Scalabrinian Missionaries. They ran a hostel for teenagers in London. There was a record of expenses tied to trips to London by Vatican dignitaries, and the cost of "investigative activities to lay false trails". There were bills for medical expenses and gynecologists. A last entry was for "general activity and transfer to Vatican City, with completion of final procedures."
Greg Burke a Vatican spokesperson said that Fittipaldi's claims were "false and ridiculous." The documents are neither signed nor have an official stamp, but Fittipaldi believes they came from the Vatican, even if he cannot vouch they are genuine.
Were they produced to lay a false trail and harass the Vatican, or are they true?
This announcement came from Alessandro Diddi, a new criminal prosecutor, who reopened the case at the end of 2022. The Holy See has sent all relevant information to his offices. Included in the evidence are interrogations with people who held papal positions during the years surrounding the teenager's disappearance. This is the first time the Vatican has publicly turned over documents to the authorities.
In 2022, a Netflix documentary title Vatican Girl revealed that a high-ranking Vatican cleric was accused of making sexual advances to the girl a week before she disappeared.
In April, 2023, Pietro Orlandi played an audio tape on national television where a Roman gangster said girls were brought to the Vatican to be molested and that John Paul II knew about it.
Pope Francis described the allegations as "offensive and baseless".Pietro Orlandi, Emanuela’s brother has demanded the Vatican turn over their files
Source - LaRepubblica