Arrest in leaks case adds to Vatican woes

VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican confirmed Saturday that the pope's butler has been arrested in its embarrassing leaks scandal, adding a Hollywood twist to a sordid tale of power struggles, intrigue and corruption in the highest levels of Roman Catholic Church governance.

Paolo Gabriele, a layman and member of the papal household, was arrested Wednesday after secret documents were found in his Vatican City apartment and was continuing to be held Saturday, Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said in a statement.

Gabriele is often seen by Pope Benedict XVI's side in public, riding in the front seat of his open-air jeep during Wednesday general audiences or shielding the pontiff from the rain. He has been the pope's personal butler since 2006, one of the few members of the small papal household that also includes the pontiff's private secretaries and four consecrated women who care for the papal apartment.

His arrest followed another stunning development at the Vatican last week, the ouster of the president of the Vatican bank, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, by his board. Sources close to the investigation said he too was found to have leaked documents, though the official reason for his ouster was that he simply failed to do his job.

The "Vatileaks" scandal has seriously embarrassed the Vatican at a time during which it is trying to show the world financial community that it has turned a page and shed its reputation as a scandal-plagued tax haven.

Vatican documents leaked to the press in recent months have undermined that effort, alleging corruption in Vatican finance as well as internal bickering over the Holy See's efforts to show more transparency in its financial operations.