Vatican Priest Nunzio Scarano Arrested In Alleged Plot To Smuggle $26 Million Into Secretive Bank

Monsignor Nunzio Scarano, a Vatican official already under investigation by Italian police for an alleged money-laundering plot involving the Vatican bank, was arrested on Friday with two other people for purportedly trying to smuggle 20 million euros ($26 million) in cash into the Vatican from Switzerland by private jet. Scarano, who has been transported to a prison in central Rome, is accused of corruption and slander, charges which could land him in prison for five or six years if convicted. A former bank teller who became a priest in 1987, the monsignor was suspended a month ago from his position as a head accountant in the Vatican agency which manages the Holy See's assets. A Vatican spokesman confirmed its "willingness for full collaboration" with Italian authorities on the matter.

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The Associated Press reported that along with Scarano, Italian financier Giovanni Carenzio as well as Giovanni Zito - a member of the military police's agency for security and information - were also arrested. Prosecutor Nello Rossi detailed to reporters a plot uncovered by tapped telephone conversations in which the three had allegedly planned to smuggle into Italy some 20 million euros which Carenzio had under his name in a Swiss bank account, using the private jet to avoid paying airport customs on the sum. According to Scarano's attorney, Silverio Sica, the euros belonged to several friends - members of an Italian shipping family d'Amico, said Rossi - who had trusted Carenzio with the money to invest but wanted it back.

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Prosecutors said Zito and Carenzio were to go to Switzerland to withdraw the money, after which Zito would bring it back to Italy and drop it off at Scarano's Rome apartment. But upon Carenzio and Zito's arrival in Switzerland, Carenzio said there were problems with withdrawing the sum, and Zito went home empty-handed. Still, he demanded a fee of 600,000 euros from Scarano for his part in the operation. Scarano gave him a check of 400,000 and a second of 200,000 euros, which he quickly reported as missing in order to keep Zito from accessing it.

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The arrests come only two days after Pope Francis appointed a special commission to oversee the Institute for Religious Works - the Vatican's bank, which was once described by Forbes as "the most secret bank in the world". Francis has voiced little tolerance for corruption or lust for money or power on the part of Vatican officials, saying he wants a "poor" church which also works for the most needy. "St Peter didn't have a bank account," he has jested.

The AP notes that euros are issued in relatively high denominations, meaning that if the cash had been withdrawn in the largest denomination - 500 euro notes - it would have weighed 44 kilograms (97 pounds) and fit in a suitcase.