The Vatican police have arrested an individual in possession of private Vatican documents in connection to the so-called "VatiLeaks" scandal that began in January."This person now is being questioned by the Vatican magistrates for further information," said Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, who declined to name the person.
We now know this person to be the personal butler to the Pope, namely Paolo Gabriele, 40, who has been at the Pope’s side for six years, and is one of the German born pontiff’s closest members of his inner circle which totals just four lay people and four nuns and is always at his side.
He told reporters May 25 that the Vatican gendarmes "identified a person illicitly in possession of private documents."
The committee of three cardinals Pope Benedict XVI appointed in April to look into the leaks had asked the gendarmes to investigate.
In response to questions, Passionist Father Ciro Benedettini, assistant director of the Vatican press office, said the suspect was "under arrest." However, he declined to say if or where the person was being held.
Dozens of private letters to Pope Benedict and other confidential Vatican correspondence and reports, including encrypted cables from Vatican embassies around the world, were leaked to an Italian journalist, Gianluigi Nuzzi. He published the documents in a book, "Your Holiness," released May 17.
In a statement two days later, Father Lombardi called the publication of the letters for commercial gain a "criminal act" and said the Vatican would take legal action.
The publication, he said, violated the right to privacy and the "freedom of correspondence" of Pope Benedict, the letter writers and the pope's closest collaborators.
In the book's introduction, Nuzzi said his main source for the texts said he was acting with a "small group" of Vatican insiders concerned about corruption and a thirst for power within the Vatican.
According to the source, Nuzzi said, none of the people giving him documents knew who the others were.