Vatican drops Italian extradition bid in test of fair trial

ROME (AP) — The Vatican on Monday abruptly abandoned its extradition request for an Italian woman wanted on embezzlement-related charges in a case that could have tested whether Italy considers the Vatican a place where someone can get a fair trial.

At the hearing in a Milan court, the Vatican said it no longer was seeking to detain Cecilia Marogna, thereby removing any reason to proceed with an evaluation of her extradition. A statement from Vatican prosecutors said their decision would let her participate freely in an “imminent" trial in the city state.

However, the maneuver seemed more aimed at avoiding an embarrassing precedent that the Milan court could have set by ruling against Vatican prosecutors, given there is no extradition treaty between the two states. Marogna’s lawyers could have also argued that without such a treaty, Italian law bars sending citizens to a country where their “fundamental right” to a fair trial isn’t guaranteed.

Vatican prosecutors have accused Marogna of embezzlement and misappropriation of Holy See funds. They say she was paid at least 575,000 euros by the Vatican secretariat of state from 2018-2019 to help liberate Catholic hostages, but that the money was used instead to buy Prada, Chanel and other high-end luxury goods.

Italian police arrested Marogna in Milan on Oct. 13 based on an international warrant issued by the Vatican via Interpol. With the Vatican insisting she posed a flight risk, Marogna was jailed for two weeks before an Italian court ordered her freed. Recently, Italy’s highest court ruled that she never should have been arrested before a court evaluated whether she could be extradited.

In a statement Monday after the Vatican bailed on the extradition request, Marogna’s attorneys blasted what they said was the Vatican’s “dishonorable” decision...