In the wake of the Pope’s butler being arrested, the Slate Explainer laid out what law and order in the country of Vatican City looks like. A sample:
Vatican City does boast a single jail, just to the south of St. Peter’s Basilica, for pretrial detention, but it’s small and more often used for storage of equipment than criminals. It’s probably best that Vatican officials outsource their jailing duties, since they haven’t proven particularly adept at guarding prisoners. In the 1950s, a jailed monsignor escaped from the Tower of Winds, locked the warden in the cell that once held him, and strolled across the border into Italy.
Our prairie dog writer on the coast Emmet Matheson would be a good man to answer this — has their ever been a mystery novel about a hardnosed Vatican detective? I hope so. I’d do some more Google snooping, but after the first page of results brought up a lot of stories like this, I don’t know that it’s quite Sunday morning reading.
