AFP, Vatican investigators probe cash transfers

The AFP has been working with Vatican investigators amid claims $1.1m was sent to Australia to adversely affect George Pell’s trial.

Cardinal George Pell arrives at his Vatican apartment after being acquitted of sexual abuse charges in Victoria. Picture: Victor Sokolowicz

Australian Federal Police have been working with Vatican investigators for some time over suspect transfers of money to Australia of more than $2 million related to allegations some of the money was intended to adversely affect the trial of Cardinal George Pell.

Australia’s ambassador to the Holy See in Rome has been “monitoring” the Vatican investigations into money laundering, embezzlement, extortion and fraud within the Catholic Church including sensational allegations of money transfers to Australia.

But the Australian Federal Police have taken the lead role in investigating the claims of suspect transfers to Australia and have asked the Department of Foreign Affairs to refer any matters relating to the “potential criminal charges”.

The AFP has also used Australia’s embassy in the Rome to provide connections to Vatican investigators looking at a $363 million property scandal, global transfers of millions of Euros, money laundering and embezzlement.

Pope Francis. Picture: AFP

The Vatican investigators have also been told of attempts to interfere in the sexual abuse prosecutions against Cardinal Pell to deflect him from financial reforms and anti-corruption steps he was taking at the Vatican from 2014.

DFAT officials told NSW Liberal Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells in Senate Estimates on Thursday that the Australian Embassy’s role at the Vatican was to monitor reports and “provide support for the AFP recognising the potential for a criminal matter”.

Last week Australia’s international financial watchdog, Austrac, confirmed in Senate Estimates it had examined allegations of suspicious transfers from the Vatican to Australia and passed “actionable financial intelligence” to the AFP and Victoria Police.

AFP also confirmed it was investigating the transfers and had passed information to the Victorian anti-corruption watchdog, IBAC, which looks at serious corruption across the Victoria public service.

Vatican authorities investigating allegations of embezzlement and money laundering have been given details of financial transfers to Australia between February 2017 and June 2018 totalling more than $2 million.

The international transfers from the Vatican, in four transactions, to an Australian company, are more than double the initial reports of Euros 700,000 or $1.1m being sent to allegedly adversely influence the trial of Cardinal Pell in relation to allegations of sexual abuse of two choir boys in Melbourne in the 1990s.

After two trials, an appeal and spending more than a year in jail, between 2018 and 2019, Cardinal Pell’s conviction for alleged sex abuse was unanimously reversed by the HIgh Court this year.