Defendants in 'God's banker' murder case acquitted

0 Comments | AFP, June, 2007

ROME (AFP) — All five defendants charged in the 1982 murder of Italian financier Roberto Calvi, nicknamed "God's banker" for his close ties to the Vatican, were acquitted Wednesday because of insufficient evidence.

Calvi, at age 62, was found hanging under Blackfriars Bridge in central London with rocks and bricks stuffed into his pockets after the collapse of Banco Ambrosiano, whose major stockholder was the Institute for Religious Works (IRW), the Vatican bank.

A year earlier he was arrested as part of an investigation into the bank's collapse, then released.

A London coroner initially ruled that he had commited suicide after fleeing to London to avoid prison for fraud, but a later inquest reached an open verdict.

Prosecutors who reopened the case...