Father Carlo Alberto Capella, formerly a high ranking diplomat in the apostolic nunciature in Washington, D.C., was in 2018 sentenced to five years in prison by a Vatican City court for “possession and distribution of child pornography with the aggravating circumstance of its large quantity.”
After serving his sentence in Vatican City, in a cell in the barracks of the Vatican gendarmerie, The Pillar has confirmed he has remained in Vatican City and was allowed to resume work in the second section of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State, the diplomatic department.
News of Capella’s rehabilitation first surfaced on Saturday, when the InfoVaticana web site reported that the priest had been seen in the Vatican and was “probably active in ‘internal tasks.’”
Sources close to the Secretariat of State told The Pillar that Capella was permitted to return to work at the department in 2023, after the end of his prison sentence, and had been reintroduced to the office in “an act of mercy.” He had been initially allowed to work without title or official designation, but in 2025, the priest appeared on the Vatican’s official list of departmental officials for the first time.
While Capella was incarcerated, his former Vatican colleagues visited him and remained close to him, according to multiple sources close to the Secretariat of State, since the circumstances of his confinement meant he had practically no outside visitors.
From there, The Pillar was told, it was decided to assist with finding a living situation for Capella upon his eventual release, and then some opportunity for him to assist the Vatican’s work.
One source with first-hand knowledge of the situation recalled that Capella was brought to the Secretariat of State’s office by Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the head of the second section and the Vatican’s foreign secretary.
“It was clearly presented as an act of mercy,” the official said. “The intention was that this man, who had not been laicized but clearly could not return to his diocese or serve in a parish, could collaborate in the office, and remain in the Vatican where he is effectively secluded, but without a formal office.”
Another official told The Pillar that after Capella’s release from prison, the priest “had to go somewhere, and has to do something” and that allowing him to resume work in the secretariat was seen as “a kind of Christian charity.”
