Yes, the Vatican Can Arrest People

The Vatican on Monday  announced the arrest of a Spanish high-ranking priest and a laywoman for allegedly leaking confidential documents to the authors of two new books that promise to expose more corruption and intrigue at the Holy See.

“Divulging confidential documents is a crime under the criminal code of the Vatican City State,” the Vatican remarked in a press statement.

Aimed at stemming  a new scandal — the first since the “Vatileaks” affair which saw Benedict XVI’s butler jailed for leaking private papal papers  –  the strict move shows a less known aspect of the Vatican.

There is more than prayers in the tiny walled enclave within Rome.  As an independent state, the Vatican has its own judicial system, a 130-strong Gendarmerie (military force) in addition to the Swiss Guards (basically the Pope’s bodyguards) and can detain prisoners.

Under the Lateran Pacts, an agreement made in 1929 between the Kingdom of Italy and the Holy See, the Vatican was recognized as independent state, actually the world’s smallest by by area and population.

Until 2008, the Vatican accepted Italian law automatically. Now it examines laws passed by the Italian parliament before accepting them.

Located just to the south of St. Peter’s Basilica, the papal jail is mainly used for pretrial detention.

The prison, currently accommodating Monsignor Lucio Ángel Vallejo Balda, the Spanish priest arrested on Monday, has held several guests lately — at least by Vatican standards.

Last year, during the Christmas holidays, a member of the Femen protest movement spent two nights in one of the cells after taking her  top off and  “kidnapping” the baby Jesus from the Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square.

Another cell was occupied during the same period by a man who climbed the facade of St. Peter’s Basilica in protest against European economic policies.

Perhaps the most famous inmate in modern times is Paolo Gabriele, pope Benedict’s personal butler .

He was arrested on May 23, 2012 for leaking  the sensitive documents that gave rise to the Vatileaks scandal and sentenced to 18 months in prison “in the name of His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI, gloriously reigning.”

In contrast to the usual arrangement  under which prisoners serve time in an Italian prisons, Gabriele served his sentence in the Vatican until he was pardoned by Pope Benedict on Dec. 22, 2012.

Read more at Discovery News