Verdict in Pope's butler trial expected this afternoon
(Vatican Radio) This morning, the Director of the Vatican Press Office, Fr Federico
Lombardi, spoke briefly to journalists awaiting the final verdict in the trial that
sees the Pope's former butler, Paolo Gabriele, facing charges of stealing and copying
private documents and letters and leaking them to an Italian reporter.
Fr Lombardi
said that trial proceedings reopened around 9.15 this morning when prosecution and
defence lawyers presented their closing arguments. The Prosecution has called for
Gabriele to be sentenced to three years in prison and to be excluded from any public
office that would allow him access to classified materials or permit him to repeat
the crime of which he is accused. Counsel for Defense has asked that the charge of
aggravated theft be mitigated to simple theft and has insisted that Gabriele never
intended to "harm the Church" in any way. While his actions were "reprehensible",
his lawyer claimed the accused was motivated by the specific situation in which he
found himself at the time. Speaking in his own defence, Paolo Gabriele repeated he
had acted alone and without accomplices. He said he felt he was "not a thief" but
had acted "for the good of the Church and for its visible head", the Pope.
According
to Fr Lombardi, the verdict is expected to be delivered later this afternoon.