35 Raw, The Moneychangers, 110.
36 Marcinkus’s reported dismissal of Luciani is cited. in Gurwin, The Calvi Affair, 20–21.
37 See generally Gallagher, “The Pope’s Banker,” 20.
38 “A Pontiff from Cicero?,” Chicago Tribune, June 25, 1972, A6.
39 As for the directors’ meeting, see generally Raw, The Moneychangers, 89.
40 Securities and Exchange Commission, 39th Annual Report, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1973, U.S. Government Printing Office, 73–74.
41 SEC News Digest, A Daily Summary from the Securities and Exchange Commission, “Irving Eisenberger, Able Associates Enjoined; Trading Suspended in Vetco Offshore Industries Stock,” Issue No. 73-42, March 2, 1973, Court Enforcement Actions, 1; see also Felix Belair Jr., “Court Bars Sale of Vetco Stock,” The New York Times, March 2, 1973, 47.
42 Everett Hollis, “Vatican Refund Sought by Vetco,” The New York Times, March 5, 1973, 43; see also Belair Jr., “Court Bars Sale of Vetco Stock,” 47. See “Statement on Behalf of Ragnar Option Co. and Victor Sperandeo,” included as an attachment in an unsigned letter from Willkie Farr & Gallagher to Richard Kraut, Harold Halperin, and Charles Lerner, all of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Re: Vetco Offshore Industries—Ragnar Option Co., October 31, 1973, copy in possession of author.
43 Fiduciary Investment Services was owned by Sindona. It is not clear who introduced Marcinkus and Eisenberger. Much later, Sindona told author Charles Raw that he was not responsible for the link between the IOR and Eisenberger, and moreover said that he repeatedly warned Marcinkus against doing business with small advisors. Raw, The Moneychangers, 101; Hollis, “Vatican Refund Sought by Vetco,” 43.
44 Hollis, “Vatican Refund Sought by Vetco,” 43.
45 Raw, The Moneychangers, 101; see also Thomas and Morgan-Witts, Pontiff, 149; and Martin, The Final Conclave, 30.
46 Belair Jr., “Court Bars Sale of Vetco Stock,” 47. For later Vetco legal problems with a Swiss subsidiary and U.S. tax laws, see United States v. Vetco, Inc., 691 Federal Reporter, 2d Series, 1981, 1282–91.
47 Paul VI elevated Luciani to a cardinal on March 5, 1973.
48 Robert J. Cole, “U.S. Inquiry in 1973 at Vatican Bank Is Disclosed,” The New York Times, August 7, 1982, 34.
49 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; Richard Hammer, The Vatican Connection (New York: Charter, 1983), 150–53. Hammer’s book is about Operation Fraulein. It won a 1982 Edgar Award for the year’s best true crime book. Aronwald and Tamarro told me that the book’s factual errors are because it relied too much on Coffey’s version of events. “That book is a story as told to the author by Joe Coffey,” says Aronwald. “Neither Dick Tamarro or I were interviewed for the book.”
“Coffey and I never spoke after that pulp fiction book was published,” Tamarro told me. Newsweek, in a September 13, 1982, review of The Vatican Connection, noted that while Coffey was a “key source for the book,” Hammer “bases his case chiefly on a far-from impeccable source: the unsworn testimony of two convicted con men and an accomplice.”
50 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 51–52.
51 Ibid., 64–70.
52 Jane Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” The Wall Street Journal, August 6, 1982, 2.
53 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 100.
54 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; see also Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 76–98.
55 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 77–78.
56 Ibid., 210–11.
57 Alfred Scotti, Deputy District Attorney, New York, quoted in Arnold H. Lubasch, “Disposal of Illicit Paper Is Charged Here,” The New York Times, July 12, 1973, 1.
58 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007. Aronwald’s Strike Force was a specially formed group inside the Organized Crime and Racketeering Division, assigned to the Southern District of New York.
59 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; see also Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2.
60 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 154–55.
61 Ibid., 144, 158–59.
62 Ibid., 210–12.
63 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007. Before Tamarro’s trip to Germany, the FBI had relied exclusively on its legal attachés in U.S. embassies when it came to any foreign case.
64 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
65 Ibid.
66 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 219.
67 Cole, “U.S. Inquiry in 1973 at Vatican Bank Is Disclosed,” 34.
68 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; see also DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 108–14; “Hambros in Italy,” The Economist, October 16, 1971, 100, 103; “The End: Bastogi,” The Economist, October 23, 1971, 103, 104; “End of the Italian Affair,” The Economist, January 8, 1972, 72–73; see also Simoni and Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 122.
69 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
70 Ibid.
71 In 1946, Cardinal Tisserant—a French intelligence agent during World War I—met with Argentine Cardinal Antonio Caggiano at the Vatican. The two prelates facilitated the flight of French war criminals to Argentina. Since that information was made public in 2003, the Vatican has refused to release any files about the matter. The Argentine Catholic Church claimed to the author that the relevant records were destroyed in a 1955 fire. Kevin G. Hall, “Argentina’s New President Pressured to Open Perón Files on Nazis,” Knight Ridder Washington Bureau, International News, June 1, 2003.
72 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007; author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 235–38.
73 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; see also Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2.
74 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 216.
75 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
76 Lubasch, “Disposal of Illicit Paper Is Charged Here.”
77 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
78 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 249–50.
79 Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2; also author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
80 James Bacque, “How a Manhattan Detective Trailed a Small-Time Hood and Ended Up Investigating Some Strange and Possibly Illegal Dealings of the Vatican Bank,” The Globe and Mail (Canada), January 15, 1983.
81 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 215–16.
82 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007; see also Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 241–45.
83 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
84 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
85 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
86 Ibid.
87 Ibid.
88 Seymour had recently announced his resignation for personal reasons. Nixon had announced his replacement, Paul Curran, the Chairman of the New York State Commission of Investigation, but the Senate had not yet approved him. Aronwald fully briefed Curran on the meeting and the investigation once he took charge later that month (April 1973).
89 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
90 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 301–2. Aronwald told the author: “Sure he [Coffey] was upset, but it was simply our jurisdiction at that stage. The meeting at the Vatican was super sensitive, and we didn’t want to mess it up by taking a large group there. There were plenty of people besides Coffey who wanted to
go. My biggest concern was that if we started to get too large on our side, the Vatican might change its mind and cancel.” Years later, Coffey speculated to author Richard Hammer that the Nixon administration had sidetracked a harder investigation because the President feared upsetting Catholic voters before the reelection. Aronwald insists, however, “No one ever pressured me and I was running the case.”
91 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
92 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
93 Ibid.
94 Ibid.
95 Ibid.
96 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007. Tom Biamonte, the FBI liaison officer at the American embassy in Rome, had lobbied Marcinkus to speak to the Justice Department trio. “We had no right to enter the Vatican unless specifically invited,” Biamonte later said. “But out of courtesy to us at the embassy, he [Marcinkus] agreed to answer any questions they wanted to throw at him.” Biamonte interviewed in Cornwell, A Thief in the Night, 172.
97 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
98 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
99 Biamonte interviewed in Cornwell, A Thief in the Night, 172.
100 Monsignor Fornasari was a well-known Vatican attorney who practiced before the Apostolic Tribunal of the Roman Rota, the church’s equivalent of the Supreme Court. He also had a side business in manufacturing rosaries and crucifixes.
101 Hammer, The Vatican Connection, 305–6.
102 FBI File summary of the interview with Marcinkus, quoted and cited in Raw, The Moneychangers, 102.
103 Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2.
104 Cornwell, A Thief in the Night, 172.
105 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007; author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
106 Jane Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” The Wall Street Journal, August 6, 1982, 2.
107 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
108 Author interview with Richard Tamarro, February 28, 2007.
109 Interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
110 Lubasch, “Disposal of Illicit Paper Is Charged Here,” 1; Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2.
111 Lubasch, “Disposal of Illicit Paper Is Charged Here,” 1; the case, U.S. v. Amato, et al., is on Pacer, the legal database, at 1:73-cr00672-MGC, filing date of July 10, 1973.
112 Rizzo pled guilty and was given a five-year sentence to serve concurrently with his drug trafficking conviction. The government never pursued extradition requests against either Ledl or Foligni, both of whom were never tried.
113 Mayer, “Vatican Bank’s Marcinkus Was Queried in U.S. Counterfeiting Case 9 Years Ago,” 2; author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
114 Author interview with William Aronwald, February 16, 2007.
Chapter 17: Il Crack Sindona
1 Paul Hofmann, “War Raids Incite Anti-U.S. Feelings in Italy,” The New York Times, January 3, 1973, 8. In the State Department that year, 1973, there was a flurry of diplomatic cable traffic over the “Vatican’s ‘contacts’ with Communists” in Vietnam. It was about fears the Pope might reach out to the Vietcong. See generally 09-25-73 WikiLeaks Vatican “Contacts” with Communists Cable: 1973ROME10199_b; https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1973ROME10199_b.html; also 09-28-73 WikiLeaks Audience with Pope Paul VI (Held at Vatican Suggestion) Cable: 1973ROME10410_b; https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1973ROME10410_b.html.
2 “Two Bombings in Milan,” The New York Times, January 16, 1973, 14.
3 Paul Hofmann, “El Al Employe [sic] in Rome Is Shot to Death by an Arab: 3 Seized at Beirut Airport,” The New York Times, April 28, 1973, 6.
4 Paul Hofmann, “Italian Neo-Fascists Are Linked to a Synagogue Fire in Padua,” The New York Times, April 30, 1973, 3.
5 “Anarchist Seized in Blast in Milan,” The New York Times, May 18, 1972, 7.
6 Paul Hofmann, “If Surge of Gunfire Is a Sign, Sicilian Mafia Is in Trouble,” The New York Times, May 15, 1973, 41.
7 Paul Hofmann, “Italians Suspect Violence Is Plot: International Police Aid Is Asked After Milan Blast,” The New York Times, May 21, 1973, 9.
8 “Again Italy’s Premier: Mariano Rumor,” The New York Times, July 9, 1973, 3.
9 Ibid.
10 “Milan Offices Bombed,” The New York Times, July 29, 1973, 3.
11 “Libyan Jets Attack an Italian Warship off African Coast,” The New York Times, September 22, 1973, 2.
12 William D. Smith, “The Arab Oil Weapon Comes into Play,” The New York Times, October 21, 1973, 185; DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 194–95.
13 Robert D. Hershey Jr., “10 Years After Oil Crisis: Lessons Still Uncertain,” The New York Times, September 25, 1983, 1.
14 “Europeans Move to Conserve Oil,” The New York Times, November 8, 1973, 71.
15 Clyde H. Farnsworth, “Oil: Alarms Growing in Europe and U.S.: Continent Worries About a Possible ’74 Recession,” The New York Times, November 21, 1973, 51; “Deep Recession Seen for Europe,” The New York Times, December 1, 1973, 47; “Oil Shortage Abroad Puts Stocks in Different Light,” The New York Times, December 3, 1973, 63.
16 Terry Robards, “Oil-Short Europe Is Facing Hardest Winter Since War,” The New York Times, December 11, 1973, 1.
17 “Kuwait Considers Giving Hijackers to Guerrilla Group for Trial,” The New York Times, December 21, 1973, 14.
18 “Pope Urges Italians to Shun A ‘Mafia-Style Mentality,’ ” The New York Times, January 2, 1974, 13.
19 Martin Andersen, “Argentina Can’t Exorcise Fascination with Perón,” The Miami Herald, July 3, 1987, Q17; Martin Andersen, “$10 Million Demanded for Return of the Hands Cut from Perón’s Body,” The Globe and Mail (Canada), July 3, 1987; Susana Viau and Eduardo Tagliaferro, “Carlos Bartffeld, Mason y Amigo de Massera,” December 14, 1998, 12.
20 Tosches, Power on Earth, 169–71.
21 There are conflicting accounts of precisely when Calvi and Gelli met, but the best evidence is that it was sometime in 1974, although they did not do regular business together until the following year. Calvi’s wife, Clara, thought it could have been as early as 1973, but she was not present. Willan, The Last Supper, 112–13. See also Raw, The Moneychangers, 139.
22 Sindona interviewed in Tosches, Power on Earth, 171
23 Calvi quoted in Willan, The Last Supper, 112.
24 Gelli interviewed in ibid., 126–27.
25 When the police eventually seized Gelli’s P2 records, it showed Calvi was initiated into the Rome branch in 1974, and became a member of a Geneva lodge the following year. See Willan, The Last Supper, 111–12. Some publications also link Calvi to a London Masonic lodge, but there is no evidence he was a member there. It appears that P2 had an affiliation to a London lodge, and that was sufficient for Calvi in case he needed to call upon one of its British members.
26 Sindona interviewed in Tosches, Power on Earth, 172.
27 Ibid., 172–73.
28 Bastogi had large interests in Italian utility, mining, and cement industries. Count Giuseppe Volpi owned it during World War II. Sindona secretly acquired some shares starting in the late 1960s. In 1971, he enlisted Calvi and the British merchant bank Hambros to quietly accumulate more of Bastogi, using Ultrafin, a Swiss holding company that could not easily be traced to them. When Bastogi’s board learned of Sindona and Calvi’s takeover interest, they put up a fierce battle—much of which played out publicly—to successfully retain control. Hostile takeovers were unheard of in Italy at the time, and in its aftermath Sindona was the public relations loser, seeming by Italian business standards too hungry a predator. See Galli, Finanza bianca, 82.
; 29 The Pierre was best known as a five-star luxury hotel, but it also had seventy-seven condominium apartments that were maintained under the hotel’s general management. Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It, n. 315 (citing Exhibit Carli, January 28, 1981 Mec. I/5), 18.
30 Affidavit of John McCaffrey, February 3, 1981, quoted at length in DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 1046; see also Willan, The Last Supper, 86–87.
31 Marcinkus interviewed in Cornwell, A Thief in the Night, 132.
32 Tosches, Power on Earth, 149.
33 Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It, 20–22.
34 Farnsworth, “Sindona’s Empire: Sharp Trading, Big Losses,” 57. Sindona’s merged bank had no assets: see Lai, Finanze vaticane, 53.
35 The Bank of Italy conducted four investigations of Sindona’s businesses, dating back to his failed attempt to take over Bastogi. Farnsworth, “Sindona’s Empire: Sharp Trading, Big Losses,” 57. See also Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 122; and “Hambros in Italy,” The Economist, October 16, 1971, 100. As for the questions over the Bank of Italy’s failure to find evidence during its regularly scheduled annual reviews, see Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the Case of Sindona and Responsibilities and the Political and Administrative Connected To It, 19–20; Turone, Il caffè di Sindona, 40.
36 DiFonzo, St. Peter’s Banker, 182–83. Some published reports assert that in exchange for his donation, Sindona demanded and got his friend Mario Barone appointed as the chief of the Bank of Rome (Willan, The Last Supper, 81). The author was unable to confirm this was a quid pro quo for the Sindona contribution to the anti-divorce battle. See also William Tuohy, “Italy Retains Divorce, 3–2; Rebuff to Vatican, State,” The Boston Globe, May 14 1974, 1.
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