A senior accountant at the Vatican was arrested Friday for a plot to smuggle $26 million in cash into Italy aboard a private jet.
Monsignor Nunzio Scarano headed a department in the Vatican’s property-management division.
He’s accused of fraud and corruption.
He was allegedly trying to smuggle money that belonged to a friend.
Italian police say Scarano had arranged to fly bags of cash from Switzerland to Italy to evade customs and taxes.
The Vatican suspended Scarano from his Vatican job about a month ago, according to ABC news, for alleged money laundering. ‘In that inquiry,’ ABC said, ‘Scarano is accused of taking more than $700,000 donated for terminally ill patients and using it to pay off a personal mortgage.’
Investigators said he withdrew ‘$16,000 at a time, giving it to 56 different friends, who then paid him back with checks so he could avoid detection,’ according to ABC.
Earlier this week, Pope Francis announced a commission to investigate operations at the Vatican Bank.
Scarano was arrested near Rome Friday. He’s being held in the city’s Queen of Heaven jail, his lawyer said.
Comments are closed for this article!