The Vatican priest arrested in a 20 million euro
(£17 million) smuggling plot has admitted he behaved wrongly but said he
was only trying to help out friends.
Monsignor Nunzio Scarano, dubbed "Don 500" because of his
purported favourite euro banknote, was questioned for three hours by
Judge Barbara Callari, who must decide whether to confirm his arrest.His lawyer Silverio Sica said that Scarano is not well in prison and had asked for house arrest to await a decision on his fate, expected in a day or two.
Scarano was arrested on Friday with two others in an elaborate plot to smuggle 20 million euros from a Swiss bank account into Italy by private jet without reporting it to customs.
It was the latest financial scandal to hit the Vatican and its embattled bank, which has long been regarded as an offshore tax haven prone to scandal.
Mr Sica said Scarano "recognised it wasn't legal," but acted to help out his friends.
Prosecutors have identified the friends as Italy's d'Amico shipping family and said they presumably had the money in Switzerland to avoid paying Italian taxes. The prosecutors have refused to say whether any members of the d'Amico family are under investigation.
The others arrested with Scarano were Italian financier Giovanni Carenzio and Giovanni Zito, who until recently was a member of the Italian military police's security and information agency.
According to phone tapped conversations, the three allegedly plotted to smuggle the cash that Carenzio held in a Swiss bank account without declaring it to authorities at the airport.
Zito was to be the carrier, since his high rank would have enabled him to pass through customs undetected.
In the end, the plot never transpired: Carenzio reneged at the last minute, saying he could not get the cash.
Scarano, as well as the other two, are also accused of corruption. If they are indicted and convicted, they could face up to five to six years in prison, prosecutors said.
Mr Sica acknowledged that story set out by prosecutors is true.
But he said the defence would contest the corruption accusation on technical grounds.
"We cannot deny the facts," he said.
"But for us, there aren't the technical reasons for the corruption accusation, and we believe that he did this to help out his friends."