Romanzo Criminale TV - Satanic Vatican documentary - Freemasons on Trial TV - Lost Symbol: Fact or Fiction - Conspiracy: The Pope and the Mafia Millions TV - Robert Cornwell TV - Conspiracy: Murder at the Vatican TV - The Comic Strip Presents TV - Frontline PBS/Panorama BBC TV - Vatican Girl: The Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi TV - The Vatican Fiancial Empire: A Hidden History 2024 - Ross Kemp: The Mafia & Britain TV -
The body of Roberto Calvi was found this morning in London hanging from the scaffolding under Blackfriars Bridge. It would appear that the most likely cause of death is suicide. Romanzo Criminale s2e4, television news, Sky Cinema 2 2012
After fleeing Italy in 1982 Brother Calvi [Vatican Bank] is found hanging under Blackfriars Bridge. Satanic Vatican, documentary
P2 Lodge: Gelli was also a central figure in the collapse of Banco Ambrosiano as well as the murder of Roberto Calvi. ibid.
The dubious suicide of God’s banker: there is one secret society who some conspiracy theorists believe are behind this mysterious death ... of Roberto Calvi, who was a member of the defunct Masonic Lodge P2 ... On the 18th June 1982 Blackfriars Bridge in London became the focus of a murder mystery that put Freemasons in the line of fire. A discovery is made at dawn: the discovery of a well-dressed body found hanging under the bridge. His wallet is stuffed full of cash. A fake passport and his pockets are full of bricks. Freemasons on Trial
This was one of the most high-profile deaths of the twentieth century. Some believe that freemasonry stems from stone-masonry, and for that reason some people thought that the bricks found in Roberto Calvi’s pockets were a possible link to freemasonry. And there is London itself which is the spiritual home of freemasonry. Where the idea of this modern secret brotherhood was born. Then there’s Blackfriars Bridge, just a Tube stop from the Grand Lodge of England and within sight of St Paul’s Cathedral. Built by masons under the supervision of the brotherhood’s greatest architect, Sir Christopher Wren. Roberto Calvi was a member of P2, a renegade Masonic Lodge. And Friars was apparently a nickname P2 called themselves. London police soon ruled his death a suicide, a desperate man on the run. His life collapsing around him. It could have been possible that Roberto Carlo chose to end it all: but to his son Carlo it all didn’t add up. ibid.
These allegations whether true or not eventually led the authorities to become suspicious and the scandal was derailed. P2 was officially shut down in the summer of 1981 after police raided Gelli’s home and found a list of P2 members. This had drastic consequences for Roberto Calvi and ultimately lead to his downfall. ibid.
On the 18th of June 1982 Blackfriars Bridge in London became the focus of a murder mystery that put the Masons in the line of fire. A grisly discovery is made at dawn: the body of a well-dressed man is found hanging under the bridge. His wallet stuffed full of cash along with a fake passport and pockets filled with bricks. The body was identified as Roberto Calvi. Calvi was the chairman of Banco Ambrosiano, Italy’s largest private bank with close ties to the Vatican. The tabloid press exposed a mass of scandal and financial embezzlement. Calvi was also a member of P2, a clandestine quasi-Masonic Lodge run by a powerful Italian financier Lichio Gelli, a former envoy of Mussolini’s. Lost Symbol: Fact or Fiction
This is the body of God’s banker. At 7:30 a.m. June 18th 1982 his body was found swinging from Blackfriars Bridge. The cause of death – asphyxiation by hanging ... Roberto Calvi was the man people called God’s banker. Now technically he was more like the Pope’s banker but that doesn’t sound quite as impressive. Anyway, he earned his rather grand title by becoming head of Italy’s largest private bank, and more importantly, getting mixed up in the Vatican’s complicated finances. Now he was a powerful and well-connected man. So why did he end up hanging from scaffolding here under Blackfrairs Bridge in London? Calvi wasn’t just connected to the Vatican. He also had links with the Mafia and Italian Freemasons. He had a lot to hide and a lot of secrets to tell. Conspiracy: The Pope and the Mafia Millions
Everything really started to go wrong for Calvi when the debts at his bank spiralled out of control. It got worse: Calvi was arrested for currency fraud. During his time inside he started to talk. He committed the ultimate banker’s crime and began spilling his clients’ secrets. With his bank facing financial collapse Calvi now had every reason to flee Italy ... The Vatican, the Mafia, the Italian Freemasons, he knew all their darkest secrets and was threatening to expose them. ibid.
He had enough drugs back at his flat to do the job quietly and probably painlessly. There was also no suicide note. Calvi’s family found it hard to accept the original Inquest verdict of Suicide. A second Inquest returned an Open verdict ... There were no struggle marks on Calvi’s body. ibid.
There was no shortage of suspects. When Calvi fled to London he took a briefcase along with him ... It was full of incriminating documents linking Banco Ambrosiano to all sorts of shady dealings. And the contents were said to be so important to Calvi that he even slept with the briefcase; he never let it out of his sight. But after Calvi’s death the briefcase was nowhere to be found. ibid.
Then in a bizarre twist the briefcase surfaced on Italian television. The contents were poured over live on Italian national TV. It had all sorts of interesting stuff in it – Calvi’s wallet, his driving licence, even a false passport. But by this stage of course most of the incriminating documents had vanished. So could Calvi really have been killed for the contents of his briefcase? ibid.
Calvi was a member of a Masonic lodge in Italy the members of which wore black robes and called each other Friars – Black Friars. ibid.
The head honcho at the P2 was this man – Lichio Gelli. Gelli got Calvi to join his P2 lodge so that he could turn Calvi’s bank into the prefect vehicle for financing the P2’s rather questionable activities. Like backing right-wing dictators in Latin America. And accepting CIA money to cement terrorism. And then there’s the arms dealing. P2 were alleged to have supported the Argentine government in the Falkland’s war, even supplying them with Exocet missiles. All of these funds passed through Calvi’s bank. ibid.
He would talk about they being after me and not being specific who they were. He didn’t really tell me anything ... This was a man who was frightened, who was hunted, and who was aware that the end probably wasn’t far off. Robert Cornwell, author, televised report of 1982 meeting with Calvi
In the early 1980s one name was synonymous with corporate corruption on a global scale: Roberto Calvi. As one of Italy’s top bankers it’s claimed he was profiting from vast sums of money laundered by the Mafia and the Vatican. A plot that some say led to his death in London and a murder enquiry which is still open today. Calvi was nicknamed God’s banker. Conspiracy s1e8: Murder at the Vatican, Channel 5 2015
There is a rumour in Rome that Aldo Vini, chairman of Banco Ambiguani, has embezelled 200 million dollars of the bank’s money. The Comic Strip Presents s4e5: Spaghetti Hoops, opening caption, 1990
Just tell them it’s creative accountancy. ibid. Aldo to daughter
The story of an Italian banker: for a while he had the Midas touch; he masterminded a financial empire. It enriched fascists and priests. Bankers and swindlers. When it all crashed, the scandal reached even to the inner sanctum of the Catholic church. Tonight: the story of the man called God’s Banker. Frontline PBS & BBC Panorama: God’s Banker ***** PBS February 1983
Calvi’s Italian bank was in big trouble. ibid.
It’s a puzzle to which we have some of the pieces … Power, politics and the Catholic church … The investigation was triggered by the death of Roberto Calvi. ibid.
Calvi was inducted into an illegal cell of Italian Freemasons … ibid.
It was the Vatican’s cash assets Calvi helped to manage. ibid.
This is the headquarters of Calvi’s bank in Nassau. [Archbishop] Marcinkus was a director of the bank: very unusual for an Archbishop. ibid.
Gelli was also the Grandmaster of an illegal ultra-secret political society of Italian Freemasons. In the 1970s he inducted almost a thousand of Italy’s most powerful men in clandestine rituals here in Rome’s Excelsior Hotel. Gelli created an organisation of the radical right, a state within a state, taking in government ministers, generals, heads of corporations and major banks like Calvi. Even the head of the Italian secret service. They called themselves Propaganda Due, and when they were uncovered in March 1981 the scandal brought down the Italian government. ibid.
Gelli persuaded Calvi to to buy 40% of Italy’s largest and most prestigious newspaper the Corriere Della Sera. ibid.
Calvi invested heavily in extreme right-wing anti-communist newspapers in Uruguay and Argentina. Gelli’s closest contact in South America was the Argentinian dictator Juan Peron. ibid.
P2 and the ultimately respectable but also secretive Vatican were using Calvi’s bank to move money for political purposes. P2 was exposed in March 1981. ibid.
Italian authorities became suspicious of Calvi’s deals on the Milan stock exchange. ibid.
Too much was becoming public and Calvi began to fear for his life. ibid.
We don’t know why Calvi was taken to London. ibid.
Roberto Calvi could be directly connected with the kidnapping of of Emanuela [Orlandi]. It seems that the two crimes were carried out by the same people, the Mafia. The same target, the Vatican, and the same message, Give back our money. Vatican Girl: The Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi II, reporter, Netflix 2022
We have this Vatican girl in our hands. So give us our money back. ibid.
On a quiet night in 1982 Italian banker Roberto Calvi is on the run. He has spent a lifetime working for Banco Ambrosiano, a bank whose biggest customer is the Vatican. But now he’s fugitive, desperately trying to escape the long arm of the law. The Vatican Financial Empire: A Hidden History, Youtube 50.27, 2024
‘The body of missing financier Roberto Calvi, the central figure in a $790 million bank fraud scandal, was found hanging from a London bridge Friday, the police said.’ ibid. US news
For centuries the Catholic Church has been a monumental figure of human history … But it is also a powerful financial institution with the world’s largest real estate collections and vested interests in a vast number of corporations. ibid.
The Church reaches out to an unlikely financier – the Rothschilds … The Rothschilds lent the Vatican 40 million Euros in today’s money. It becomes a lifeline the Church desperately needs. ibid.
The Vatican Bank: It’s a perfect vehicle to hide and launder money. ibid.
Working with [Michele] Sindona is one of the worst mistakes the Church has ever made. ibid.
Within just a few short years, Calvi and Sindona have grown their own financial empires bigger and faster than almost anyone. ibid.
By 1982 Robert Calvi realizes that his financial schemes cannot be sustained any longer. ibid.
The Church agrees to pay $244 million in a legal settlement involving Banco Ambrosiano. ibid.
‘Michele Sindona, one of Italy’s most successful financiers whose empire collapsed amid charges of fraud and murder, died today in a Voghera hospital of cyanide poisoning.’ ibid. US news
Despite being implicated in the massive financial scandal surrounding the collapse of Banco Ambrosiano in 1982, [Archbishop] Marcinkus manages to avoid legal consequences. ibid.
In the 1990s the Vatican Bank faces unprecedented scrutiny and scandal. ibid.
A crisis is brewing, one that will expose a darkness far greater than any financial misdeeds. ibid.
Allegations of corruption, financial mismanagement, power struggles and internal conflict within the Vatican hierarchy. ibid.