New clue turns up in 'God's banker' death

The Guardian ^ | October 14, 2002 | Philip Willan

[Tlaloc]

Italian investigators have discovered a safety deposit box belonging to Roberto Calvi some 20 years after "God's banker" was found hanging from scaffolding under Blackfriars Bridge in London.

The safety deposit box, held at a Milan branch of the Banco Ambrosiano of which Calvi was chairman, reportedly contained a builder's brick, newspaper articles dating from the summer of 1981 and documents which police hope will help them to solve the puzzle of the banker's death.

One mystery they will seek to clarify is how the bank safe remained unnoticed for all these years. It was registered in the names of Calvi and his mother and in recent years had been under the control of one of his brothers, Leone.

The safe reportedly came to light two weeks ago and investigators have since searched four properties belonging to Leone Calvi for further clues.

The Banco Ambrosiano chairman was found hanged in London in 1982 following the £770m collapse of his bank in a financial scandal that implicated the Vatican, the Mafia and international Freemasonry.

Investigators said that the brick, wrapped in a copy of the newspaper Corriere della Sera, could constitute a cryptic reference to the Freemasons, as well as recalling the brick fragments that were found on Calvi's body - in his pockets and stuffed down the front of his trousers.

"That brick could be a warning, a message in code," an unnamed investigator told the Rome daily Il Messaggero.

Calvi's son, Carlo, expressed astonishment yesterday at the discovery.

"That safety deposit box should have been handed over from the beginning. Something hasn't worked as it should have done within the bank, and I would like to know the reason why," he told the Rome daily La Repubblica.

Rome prosecutors are awaiting the results of a fresh post-mortem examination of the banker's body, which is expected to confirm that he was murdered.

In 1997 they charged several Mafiosi and a Sardinian businessman, Flavio Carboni, with complicity in his murder. Mafia turncoats have accused the self-confessed Mafia boss Francesco Di Carlo, who lived in the UK, of strangling Calvi to punish him for absconding with some of Cosa Nostra's money.

Mr Di Carlo, who is himself now collaborating with the investigators, denies the charge.

[TomServo]

It was the Corleone Mob Family. I thought everybody knew this.

[BlackVeil]

"That brick could be a warning, a message in code," an unnamed investigator told the Rome daily Il Messaggero ... They had better take any warning seriously. A very sinister case.

[Slyfox]

Interesting about the brick, seeing as how there has been talk abounding over the years that some of the cardinals are freemasons, when the Church forbids a Catholics involvement in that organization.

[Shermy]

"Interesting about the brick, seeing as how there has been talk abounding over the years that some of the cardinals are freemasons, when the Church forbids a Catholics involvement in that organization."

Wow. You might be on to something. There was the P-2 Masonic Lodge scandal in Italy. Lots on the internet. Here's one bit:

Murder in the Vatican?

"...John Paul I, who "died in his sleep" (very likely, he was poisoned) after 33 days of papal rule in 1978, was a reformer who made many enemies, even within the walls of the Vatican, because he had started to raise a stink over the Vatican Bank scandal. The "disappearance" of millions of Church dollars into the black hole of Roberto Calvi's Banco Ambrosiano certainly ended up costing Calvi his life (a "suicide" that required a considerable ability in self-hanging, as well as knowledge of Masonic ritual murder) and resulted in a major Italian political scandal when it was found that many magnates of finance, the army, parliament, and industry were members of a super-secret Masonic lodge, Propaganda Due (P2). Also implicated in the affair were Michele "the Shark" Sindona, Licio Gelli (Grandmaster of P2), and even some Archbishops, such as Paul "the Gorilla" Marcinkus and Luigi Mennini. The Church stood accused of allowing its money for 'charitable works' to disappear into dummy companies, Mafia organized crime, and even drug money laundering. It was further discovered that Marcinkus as chairman of the IOR (Institute of Religious Works - the Vatican Bank) had written letters of confidence to enable the insolvent Ambrosiano to stay afloat, and that the Vatican had in fact owned eight of the many 'ghost' companies Calvi had created for transferring money covertly. ..."

[struwwelpeter]

But was his tongue torn out and buried where the tide ebbs and flows twice in twenty-four hours?

[EternalHope]

bump

[Red Jones]

wow

[texasbluebell]

Thanks for that interesting link. If you want to read a fascinating book, which I haven't finished yet, you might want to look for John Cornwell's "A Thief in the Night--Life and Death in the Vatican" which explores the death of John Paul I.