This is Richard Hammer's shocking book The Vatican Connection - The Astonishing Account of a Billion-Dollar Counterfeit Stock Deal Between the Mafia and the Church (1982) which is an explosive expose of worldwide swindles involving the Mafia in the United States, powerful business circles in Europe and South America, and, at the end of the line, the Vatican in Rome. From 1971 to 1973, nearly a billion dollars' worth of stolen and forged securities may have found their way into the international money market. Overwhelming testimony indicates that at least $14 million of those stocks, and perhaps much more, ended up in the Vatican of Pope Paul VI. It is a crime story as full of color, suspense and high drama as it is true. Along the way, we meet racketeers and forgers and high-level dons; hit men and financiers; small-time con artists and master swindlers; dope smugglers and Church dignitaries. The many strands of this astonishing story were gathered over the course of a two-year investigation. But no one, at the beginning could have woven a complete garment from such disparate and scattered threads. With the publication of The Vatican Connection, the full story is finally being told. At the center of this shocking tale is a dedicated New York cop named Joseph Coffey. It was his hunch, and his dogged determination to follow up on it, that eventually broke the case. This is Coffey's story, a story he knows, with all its astounding participants and intricate details, better than any man. And his knowledge is supported by transcripts, tape recordings, wiretaps, bugs, confessions, and personal recollections, all of which he has made available for the writing of this book. It's an intriguing story of the Vatican ties to Italian financier Roberto Calvi, president of Banco Ambrosiano, in which the Vatican bank held a significant stake. In 1982, Calvi's bank collapsed after the disappearance of 1.3 billion Dollars. His body was found hanging under a London bridge, and there has been debate since over whether it was murder or suicide. The Vatican Connection tells an incredible story in which the Vatican through Mgr. Marcinkus tried to use $950 million of forged bonds as a collateral for new loans. But a New York policeman discovered the transactions and the key figure was convicted. The other villains, besides the Archbishop, in this unbelievable story are very well known Mafia, masonic and money laundering figures: Michele Sindona and Roberto Calvi. 305 pages. A must read for everyone.