Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi

Emanuela Orlandi
Emanuela Orlandi
Born	14 January 1968; Rome, Italy
Disappeared	22 June 1983 (aged 15); Rome, Italy
Status	Missing for 39 years, 10 months and 24 days
Nationality	Vatican
Height	160 cm (5 ft 3 in)
Parents	Ercole Orlandi (father); Maria Orlandi (née Pezzano)[1] (mother);
Family	Pietro Orlandi (brother); Natalina Orlandi (sister); Federica Orlandi (sister); Maria Cristina Orlandi; (sister)

Emanuela Orlandi (born 14 January 1968) was a Vatican teenager who mysteriously disappeared while returning home from a flute lesson in Rome on 22 June 1983.[2] Sightings of Orlandi in various places have been reported over the years, including inside Vatican City, but all have been unreliable. Her disappearance led to much speculation on the involvement of international terrorism, Italian organized crime, the Banco Ambrosiano, and a plot inside the Holy See to cover up a sex scandal.

Orlandi's family, in particular her brother Pietro, consistently pressed the Vatican for release of information about the case, believing that the Holy See knew more than it admitted. The Vatican always maintained strict silence about the matter, denying any accusation of involvement, but over the years, many voices from inside the Holy See suggested that someone actually knew what happened to the missing girl.[3] In 2023, forty years after Orlandi's disappearance, the Vatican opened an official investigation for the first time at the behest of Pope Francis.[4]

Personal life

Emanuela Orlandi was the fourth of five children of Ercole and Maria Orlandi (née Pezzano). Her father was a lay employee in the papal household.[5] The family lived inside Vatican City, and the children had the free run of the Vatican Gardens, according to her older brother Pietro.[6]

Orlandi was in her second year of secondary school in Rome. Although the school year had concluded, she continued to take flute lessons three times per week at the Scuola di Musica Tommaso Ludovico da Victoria, connected with the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music. She was also part of the church choir at the Sant'Anna dei Palafrenieri in the Vatican.[7]

Chronology

Orlandi usually travelled by bus to the music school, located in Piazza di Sant'Apollinare. She would get off after a few stops and walk the last few hundred metres.[7] Upon leaving home around 4.00pm on 22 June 1983, Orlandi was late to class and the weather was extremely hot. She asked Pietro to drive her, but he had other commitments. "I've gone over it so many times, telling myself if only I had accompanied her maybe it wouldn't have happened", he recalled decades later.[5]

At the end of class, Orlandi phoned home and explained to her sister Federica that before the lesson, she had received a job offer from a representative of Avon Products to hand out flyers at a fashion show for 370.000 lira (around 590 euros) for two hours. Federica told her not to accept the offer, believing the compensation to be excessive and thus unreliable, and suggested discussing the matter with their parents first.[8][9] While leaving school, Orlandi spoke of the job offer with two female classmates, who then left her at a bus stop in Corso Rinascimento, in front of Palazzo Madama. She was last seen around 7:30pm at the bus stop, in the company of another girl, who was never identified.[10]

Later that night, after hours of waiting, Orlandi's family began to worry and started looking for her in an area between the Vatican and the music school. They called the director of the music school to ask if any of their daughter's classmates had any information about her. Her father then went to the police to report her as missing, but they assumed she was with friends and suggested waiting. Orlandi was officially declared missing the next morning. Over the next two days, announcements of her disappearance were published in the Italian newspapers Il Tempo, Paese Sera, and Il Messaggero.[9]

At 6:00pm on Saturday 25 June, a phone call was received from a youth who claimed to be a sixteen-year-old boy named "Pierluigi".[11] He reported that he and his fiancée had met Orlandi in Piazza Navona that afternoon. The young man mentioned her flute, hair, and a pair of glasses that she did not like to wear, along with other details that fit the missing girl. According to "Pierluigi", Orlandi had just had a haircut and had introduced herself as "Barbarella", stating that she had just run away from home and was selling Avon products.[9]

On 28 June, a man calling himself "Mario" phoned the family and claimed to own a bar near Ponte Vittorio, between the Vatican and the music school. He reported that a new customer, a young girl named "Barbara", had confided to him about being a runaway but said that she would return home for her sister's wedding. Two days later, a large number of posters displaying Orlandi's photograph were plastered across Rome.[9]

During the Angelus on 3 July, Pope John Paul II issued an appeal to those responsible for Orlandi's disappearance, making the hypothesis of kidnapping official for the first time. Two days later, the Orlandi family received the first of a number of phone calls made by an anonymous male with an American accent, who would later be called "the American". The man claimed to be calling on behalf of a terrorist organization who was holding Emanuela Orlandi prisoner and demanding the release of Mehmet Ali Ağca, the Turkish man who shot the Pope in May 1981. As proof, "the American" played a recording of Orlandi's voice over the phone. The anonymous caller also mentioned "Mario" and "Pierluigi" of the previous phone calls, identifying them as "members of the organisation". Despite decades of investigations, the real identity of "the American" has never been discovered.[9]

The next day, on 6 July, "the American" informed the Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata (ANSA) news agency of the demand for a prisoner exchange, asking for the Pope's participation within twenty days and indicating that a wastebasket in the public square near the Italian Parliament would contain proof that Orlandi was indeed in his hands. These were to have been photocopies of her music school identity card, a receipt for tuition, and a note handwritten by the kidnapped girl.[12]

On 8 July, a man with an alleged Middle Eastern accent phoned one of Orlandi's classmates, saying the girl was in his hands and that they had twenty days to make the exchange with Ağca. He also asked for a direct telephone line with Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, the Vatican secretary of state. The line was installed on 18 July. A total of sixteen telephone calls were made by "the American" from different public telephones.[9]

On the instructions of the alleged kidnappers, an audio cassette was found near ANSA's offices on 17 July, which appeared to be a recording of a girl being tortured. Police told the family they did not believe the victim to be Orlandi, although her brother has expressed doubts about this.[13] However, former DIGOS agent Antonio Asciore, who first found and listened to the cassette, claimed that the recording given to the family and later published was not the original one he found. He claimed that the original recording was longer than the published recording, and a male voice could be heard in the background. The presence of male voices was also reported in the original transcription of the recording made by police immediately after discovery, giving support to Asciore's claims that the published recording had been manipulated or faked.[14]

On 4 August 1983, ANSA received a written statement from an organization calling itself the Turkish Anti-Christian Turkesh Liberation Front, later simply referred as "Turkesh", who claimed to be holding Orlandi in exchange for Ağca's release. Turkesh sent seven letters in total between August 1983 and November 1985. Although they showed no evidence of Orlandi's captivity, Turkesh was able to provide many precise details about her private life, even mentioning the number of moles on her back.[15] In October 1983, Turkesh released a statement saying they were also responsible for the disappearance of Mirella Gregori, who had gone missing in Rome forty days before Orlandi. Italian President Sandro Pertini made a public appeal for the girls' release on 20 October 1983, linking the two cases in the public consciousness.[16]

Fourteen years later, in 1997, the first investigation of the Orlandi case was dismissed by the public prosecutor of Rome due to a lack of new evidence.[17]

In 2013, a few days after his election, Pope Francis met the Orlandi family after a mass and told them that "Emanuela is in heaven", implying the girl's death. According to the family, this statement was proof that the Holy See knew what happened to Orlandi, despite the Vatican claiming over many years that it was not involved in the matter. Pietro asked many times to have a meeting with the Pope in order to ask for more information, but the Vatican never replied.[18]

Theories

Orlandi–Ağca connection theory, Turkesh, Stasi, and the KGB

In mid-2000, Judge Ferdinando Imposimato, an Italian prosecutor with extensive experience with high-profile investigations, suggested that Orlandi, by then an adult, was living a perfectly integrated life in the Muslim community and had probably lived for a long time in Paris.[19] In a prison interview ten years later, Ağca, who had once declared that Orlandi had been kidnapped by Bulgarian agents of the Grey Wolves, stated that Orlandi was alive and living safely in a cloistered convent in central Europe.[9]

No clues were found about the existence of Turkesh, and neither Italian authorities nor international intelligence agencies believed such an organisation ever existed. However, the detailed information they provided about the girl led Italian investigators to conclude that Turkesh was a fake organization created by the people responsible for her disappearance, with the intent to mislead them. The fact that Turkesh was aware of information known only to Italian authorities led many to think that the kidnappers had links to Italian intelligence agencies.[20]

In 2008, Günter Bohnsack, a former Stasi agent, said that the secret services of East Germany used the Orlandi case to create a false connection between Ağca and the Grey Wolves in order to divert attention from investigations into the theory that Ağca was actually involved with the secret services of Bulgaria as he prepared his attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II. According to Bohnsack, it was the Stasi who sent fake letters to the Vatican, written in Turkish or Italian, in order to make them believe the Grey Wolves were holding the girl captive and wanted Ağca's release. Bohnsack said the order for this operation (called "Operation Papst") came directly from the KGB.[21]

Organised crime theory

Discovery of Enrico De Pedis grave

On 11 July 2005, an anonymous caller to the Italian television program Chi l'ha visto? said that to resolve the Orlandi case, it was necessary to look who was buried in the crypt of the Basilica di Sant'Apollinare, in Rome. It was discovered that the crypt contained the grave of Enrico De Pedis (1954–1990), leader of the Roman gang Banda della Magliana.[22]

A controversy arose as to why De Pedis, a violent criminal, had been buried in the crypt of a major Roman basilica, a mode of burial normally reserved for high-ranking figures such as cardinals.[23] In fact, a newspaper article from 1997 had reported on this strange burial, provoking protests from the police union, but when neither the Vatican nor Opus Dei (owners of the basilica) felt the need to justify it, the matter was forgotten.[22]

The anonymous caller of 2005 also suggested they investigate "the favor that De Pedis did for Cardinal Poletti", implying this was the reason for his burial at the basilica.[22] In 2012, the Italian Ministry of Interior confirmed that Poletti, who at the time of De Pedis' burial was serving as president of the Episcopal Conference of Italy and Cardinal Vicar of the Diocese of Rome, had indeed given his approval.[24] Italian police subsequently opened the tomb and took DNA samples.[25][26] While no clues were found in the tomb linking De Pedis to Orlandi, the controversy prompted speculation that Banda della Magliana was involved in the girl's disappearance.[27][5]

Testimony of Antonio Mancini and Sabrina Minardi

In February 2006, former Banda della Magliana member Antonio Mancini stated in an interview that he recognized the voice of "Mario", one of the anonymous callers from 1983, as a subordinate of De Pedis named Ruffetto. This testimony was corroborated by Sabrina Minardi, De Pedis' former girlfriend, who claimed that Orlandi was kidnapped by Banda della Magliana on the orders of Archbishop Paul Marcinkus (1922–2006), the disgraced former head of the Institute for the Works of Religion (Vatican Bank), as part of a "power game".[28] Minardi also claimed to have held a drugged Orlandi captive in her apartment in Torvaianica for several days before moving her to another apartment in Rome. She added that she was instructed by De Pedis to drive the girl to the Vatican and deliver her to a man dressed as a priest.[29]

Minardi's credibility has often been questioned due to the shifting and sometimes contradictory nature of her story, as well as her history of drug abuse. When her initial testimony was leaked to the press in June 2008, she began changing her story, confusing the sequence of events and claiming the involvement of people who had been dead by 1983. In particular, Minardi changed Orlandi's whereabouts several times, which altogether led Italian authorities to doubt her testimony.[30]

Role of Vatican Bank and Banco Ambrosiano

In 2011, Mancini suggested that Orlandi's kidnapping was tied to large money transactions through the Milan-based Banco Ambrosiano, which had been involved in both laundering money on behalf of Banda della Magliana and lending this money to IOR, the Vatican Bank. During those years, the IOR, led by Marcinkus, was using this money to fund the Solidarity movement to fight communist rule in Poland, the pope's homeland.[31] According to Mancini, following Banco Ambrosiano's collapse in 1982, the gang kidnapped Orlandi in order to force the Vatican to pay restitution.[32]

Vatican sex scandal theory

In May 2012, exorcist Gabriele Amorth claimed that Orlandi had been kidnapped by a member of the Vatican police for sex parties. He claimed that officials of an unnamed foreign embassy were involved in the conspiracy.[33][34]

This allegation re-emerged with the 2016 publication of Atto di dolore, a book by Italian journalist Tommaso Nelli, which contained an exclusive testimony from a friend of Orlandi's who claimed that, some months before her disappearance, she had confided that she had been molested by "someone close to the Pope" in the Vatican Gardens on several occasions.[35] An interview with the anonymous woman was mentioned in the Netflix documentary miniseries Vatican Girl: The Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi, released in October 2022, although in this interview, the woman said that this revelation occurred only one week before the girl's disappearance.[9]

On 14 December 2022, Italian journalist Alessandro Ambrosini published an exclusive recording of Marcello Neroni, a man affiliated with De Pedis and Banda della Magliana, who implied that Orlandi was kidnapped on the request of someone inside the Vatican for the purposes of covering up a sex scandal. After this, Italian authorities began searching for Neroni in order to question him.[36]

A presumed plot between Banda della Magliana and the Vatican had already been mentioned back in 2009 by Maurizio Abbatino, a Banda boss who had turned to aiding the judicial system.[37]

Vatileaks and London trail

In 2017, Italian journalist Emiliano Fittipaldi came into possession of secret Vatican documents that had been stolen in 2014 in the Vatican leaks scandal. One of these documents, signed 28 March 1997 and sent to Archbishop Giovanni Battista Re and Archibishop Jean-Louis Tauran, allegedly shows that the Vatican spent over 483 million lira (around 250,000 euros) on supporting Orlandi from 1983 until 1997, including expenses for her education and medical care. The document suggested that Orlandi had lived in London under Vatican protection for several years, and that her remains had been sent back to the Vatican following her eventual death. Both the Vatican and Italian authorities regard the documents as false. However, many—including the Orlandi family—speculated that the documents were leaked as a warning between internal factions within the Vatican to keep the truth secret.[38]

This was not the first time the suspicion arose that Orlandi was being hidden in London. On 17 June 2011, during an Italian television program that included Pietro Orlandi, an anonymous caller, who identified himself as a former SISMI agent, claimed that she was still alive and being kept in a mental hospital in London. The caller also claimed that the kidnapping was carried out due to the fact that her father was aware of the money laundering involving the Vatican Bank and Banco Ambrosiano.[39]

In April 2023, Pietro Orlandi revealed that he came into possession of a 1993 letter by the then-Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, to Cardinal Poletti. In the letter, Carey mentions Orlandi and suggests a personal meeting with Poletti to talk about the matter. The letter was mailed to 170 Clapham Road, London. At number 176 on the same street is the Scalabrini Fathers' Female Hostel, featured in the 2017 document, where Orlandi allegedly lived under Vatican protection. This letter lent credence to the theory that Emanuela could have been transported to London after being kidnapped. In May 2023, former archbishop Carey rejected the authenticity of the letter.[40]

Role of the Vatican

Investigations of the Vatican City

Over the years, questions were raised as to why the Vatican never opened an official investigation into Orlandi's disappearance, even though she was a Vatican citizen. The unofficial reply from the Vatican was that since she had disappeared on Italian territory, it fell under Italian jurisdiction. However, on 12 October 1993, Italian authorities recorded a telephone conversation between Raoul Bonarelli, then-deputy chief of the Gendarmerie of the Vatican City, and Monsignor Bertani, then-Chaplain of His Holiness to Pope John Paul II. The phone call took place on the eve of Bonarelli's questioning by Judge Adele Rando in relation to the Gregori case; Gregori's mother claimed to have recognized Bonarelli as the man she saw in company of her daughter shortly before her disappearance. In the phone call, Bertani ordered Bonarelli not to say anything to Italian police about the Vatican's investigations into the Orlandi case, suggesting that the Vatican had opened an investigation without informing Italian authorities.[41]

Negotiations between the Vatican and Giancarlo Capaldo

Following the discovery of De Pedis' grave in 2012, secret negotiations were held in the Palace of Justice between two emissaries of the Holy See and Giancarlo Capaldo, the then-public prosecutor of Rome. The two emissaries were Domenico Giani, the then-inspector general of the Gendarmerie of the Vatican City, and his deputy, Costanzo Alessandrini, who had been sent by the Vatican to ask Capaldo to remove De Pedis' grave. Capaldo accepted the request in exchange for information on the Orlandi case. Two days later, the emissaries accepted the trade and proposed to give Capaldo documents with names of people involved in the case. Capaldo replied that alongside these documents, he wanted Orlandi herself, dead or alive.[42]

Two weeks later, the two emissaries said that they were accepting the exchange under the condition that Capaldo would give the Orlandi family and the media a story that would absolve the Vatican of any responsitility. Not accepting this last condition, Capaldo made a public statement on 2 April 2012, saying that the Vatican was aware of the truth about the case and that he was not going to disturb the De Pedis' grave for the moment.[43] The following day, he was removed from his position and replaced by Giuseppe Pignatone, who denied the former's statement and ordered the grave to be removed.[44]

Other public speculation, activity

On the morning of 14 May 2001, the parish priest of the San Gregorio VII church, near the Vatican, discovered a human skull of small dimensions and lacking a jaw in a bag with an image of Padre Pio in a confessional. Although it was not identified as Orlandi's, the discovery generated suspicions that it might be her skull.[45]

On 6 April 2007, in a Good Friday sermon in St. Peter's Basilica, Reverend Raniero Cantalamessa advised the congregation to make amends for sins before dying. He said, "Don't carry your secret to the grave with you!" This provoked speculation that he was suggesting someone at the Vatican held information about Orlandi's disappearance. Vatican spokesperson Rev. Federico Lombardi issued a statement that detailed Vatican cooperation with civil investigators over the years and said the Church had no objection to the opening of the De Pedis tomb, which was then being discussed. The statement read, "As far as we know, there is nothing hidden, nor are there 'secrets' in the Vatican to reveal on the subject. To continue to assert it is completely unjustified; also, we reiterate, yet again, all the material from the Vatican was handed over, in its time, to the investigating magistrates and to police authorities."[46][47]

In October 2018, remains found during renovation work on the Holy See's embassy to Italy in Rome were the subject of speculation related to the Orlandi affair. An attorney for the Orlandi family objected to the media attention, saying, "We have no idea why the association with Emanuela was made.... We're still asking ourselves why you'd find some bones and immediately assume they were Emanuela's."[48] Test results released on 1 February 2019 showed the remains belonged to a Roman man who died between 190 and 230 AD.[49][50]

In the summer of 2018, the Orlandi family's lawyer received an anonymous letter with a picture of the statue of an angel in the Teutonic Cemetery, inside the Vatican. The letter read, "If you want to find Emanuela, search where the angel looks".[51] On 10 July 2019, it was announced that the Vatican would be opening two tombs inside the Teutonic Cemetery, and they would then be examined by forensic anthropologist Giovanni Arcudi. The tombs were the "Tomb of the Angel", meant to contain the remains of Princess Sophie of Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Bartenstein, and an adjacent one, which was meant to contain the remains of Duchess Charlotte Frederica of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. The exhumations took place on 11 July 2019. Neither Orlandi's body nor those of the two princesses were found.[52] The Vatican said it would conduct an investigation into the whereabouts of the princesses' remains.[53]

According to a report on 13 July 2019, the Vatican announced that two sets of bones had been found near the tombs of the two princesses, raising speculation that one might be the remains of Orlandi.[54] The bones were discovered as staff probed other locations to which the princesses' remains may have been moved within the cemetery of the Pontifical Teutonic College. Further inspection of the site revealed two ossuaries placed beneath the floor of an area inside the college, closed by a trapdoor.[55]

Reports by numerous news media outlets stated on 20 July 2019 that the tombs had actually been found to be empty. According to the BBC, for example,[56] that first July 2019 search "only deepened the mystery as even the bones of two princesses thought to be there were missing". The same finding was reported by other news outlets, including The Guardian.[57][58]

Thousands of human bones belonging to dozens of bodies were, however, found on 20 July, in the underground ossuaries at the Teutonic College. Forensic investigators were to analyse the remains and were expected to use carbon-14 methods to obtain a rough estimate of their age.[59][58]

In October 2022, Netflix released a four-part docuseries entitled Vatican Girl: The Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi.[60][61] The documentary explored different theories surrounding Orlandi's disappearance, with a focus on theories involving the Vatican and organised crime.[62]

2023 reopening of the case

On 9 January 2023, the Vatican opened its first official investigation into Emanuela Orlandi's disappearance. Pope Francis appointed head prosecutor Alessandro Diddi to lead the probe. The Vatican plans to conduct a complete review that will re-examine all files, reports, and testimony.[63]

On 11 April 2023, Pietro Orlandi gave his first official testimony to Vatican City head prosecutor Alessandro Diddi.[64]

On 15 May 2023, the Italian public prosecutor in Rome opened the third official investigation into the Orlandi case.[65]

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