Documents and computing devices were seized in the office and residence of Monsignor Alberto Perlasca, former Manager of the Administrative Service of the First Section — General Affairs — of the Secretariat of State, announced the Holy See on February 18, 2020.
The search was ordered by the Promoter of Justice, Gian Piero Milano, and by his Assistant Alessandro Diddi, in the framework of an investigation of the financial investments and real estate of the Secretariat of State.
If the Holy See recalls “the presumption of innocence,” it specifies that this decision is born “of the first interrogations of functionaries indicted and suspended from their functions.”
The Promoter’s Office and the police are pursuing their administrative and accounting investigations and their cooperation with the foreign investigation authorities specified the press release.
The seizing of documents and electronic computing devices was already carried out, in certain offices of the First Section of the Secretariat of State and of the Vatican’s Financial Information Authority, on October 1, 2019. An operation took place after complaints were filed at the beginning of last summer by the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR) and the Office of the General Comptroller concerning financial transactions.
Born in Como on July 21, 1960, and ordained a priest on June 13, 1992, Monsignor Alberto Perlasca was appointed Deputy Promoter of Justice to the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura on July 26, 2019.
In October of 2003, he was hired by the Juridical Affairs Office of the General Affairs Section of the Secretariat of State and integrated into the Holy See’s Diplomatic Service. From April 2006 to May 2008, he worked in the Apostolic Nunciature of Argentina. Then he returned to the Administrative Office of the Secretariat of State, of which he was in charge from July 2009 to July 2019.
