(Nicole Winfield, AP) A former Vatican official testified Tuesday that he was under intense “psychological pressure” to finalize a deal over the Holy See’s troubled investment in a London property, but entered into the negotiations without a lawyer and didn’t realize the deal got the Vatican nothing in return. Fabrizio Tirabassi testified for some seven hours about the frenzied meetings he attended in London Nov. 20-22, 2018 that the Holy See had thought would salvage its 350-million-euro investment in the former Harrod’s warehouse and stem its losses. Instead, the contracts negotiated in those days ended up turning control of the London property over to an Italian broker, Gianluigi Torzi, who was unknown to the Vatican only a month prior but got in the door because he was recommended by acquaintances of Pope Francis. (...)
