Emanuela Orlandi

* Living photo
* Age progressed

**Emanuela Orlandi** was a young girl who lived in Vatican City but vanished from Rome in 1983. Her case received international attention after Pope John Paul II appealed for her safe return.

## Background

Emanuela was born in Vatican City on January 14, 1968, to parents Ercole and Maria Orlandi. She had four older siblings, Pietro, Natalina, Federica, and Maria Christina, who she was allowed to play in the Vatican Gardens with. Their father was either an employee of the papal household or the Vatican bank. According to Pietro, the family felt like their home was "the safest place in the world".

At the time of her disappearance, Emanuela was attending a scientific high school and she was a member of the choir of the church of Sant’Anna dei Palafrenieri.

## Case

### Disappearance

Emanuela was last seen in Rome, Italy on June 22, 1983. She was on her summer holidays but she was still taking flute lessons three times a week at the Tommaso Ludovico Da Victoria School and she had one of those lessons that day. She asked her brother, Pietro, to take the mile-long bus ride with her to her flute practice in Piazza San'tApollinare. He refused, sparking an argument that ended with Emanuela leaving and slamming the door behind her. She later arrived at her music lesson late.

Emanuela called one of her sisters after her lesson finished. She explained that she had been late to her lesson because she had received a job offer from a representative of Avon Cosmetics. She had been asked to promote their makeup at a fashion show but her sister told her that she should speak to her parents before agreeing to anything. After the phone call, she also spoke to a female friend after the lesson and told them about the job offer. Her friend left Emanuela at the bus stop, only 180-210 meters away from the school, in the company of an unidentified girl. The last possible sighting of Emanuela occurred at approximately 7:00 p.m. when she was seen getting into a large, dark-colored car, possibly a BMW. She has not been seen or heard from since.

Emanuela's family reported her missing the day after she vanished despite law enforcement encouraging them to wait in case she was simply hanging out with friends. They also called up the music school to see if they knew anything.
Emanuela was in a good mental state at the time of her disappearance and she had been making plans for the following days so they did not believe that she had run away.

### Possible sightings

On the 24th and 25th, Emanuela’s disappearance was reported on by the Italian media, and her family phone number was published in newspapers such as the “II Tempo”, “Paese Sera” and “II Messaggero”.

At around 6:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 25, an individual claiming to be a 16-year-old boy named "Pierluigi" called the Orlandi family. He claimed that he was in Piazza Navona with his fiancée that afternoon he had seen a young girl who he believed to be Emanuela. He was able to provide an accurate physical description of Emanuella, although he said that she had just had a haircut. The girl he believed was Emanuela had called herself "Barbarella" and she told him that she had recently run away from home and that she was selling Avon products. They then received a similar call on June 28 from a man called “Mario” who claimed to have seen Emanuela at his bar near Ponte Vittorio. He had a customer who he believed was Emanuela, although she called herself “Barbara”, and she told him she had run away from home but was planning to return home eventually for her sister's wedding.

### Possible links to Mehmet Ali Ağca

Pope John Paul II made a public appeal for Emanuela's safe return during the Angelus on Sunday, July 3. Two days later, her family began receiving anonymous phone calls. The first caller claimed that their missing daughter was being held captive by a terrorist organization and that they wanted Mehmet Ali Ağca, a man who had shot the pope in 1981 and was serving a life sentence, to be released from prison. Over the following days, one of the other calls they received came from a man, later referred to as “The American” as a result of his accent, who played them a recording of Emanuela’s voice. Later the same day he also called the Vatican to ask them for an exchange of Emanuela and Ağca. He also referenced “Pierluigi" and “Mario” claiming they were both members of his organization.

On July 6, a man, who based on his accent may also have been “the American”, called the ANSA news agency to notify them of the demands to swap Emanuela and Ağca. He asked for the pope to cooperate within the next 20 days and said that there was a basket that contained evidence of him having abducted Emanuela left in a public square near the Parliament. When the basket was found these items were discovered to be photocopies of her music school ID, a note allegedly written by Emanuela, and a receipt.

Then on July 8 one of Emanuela’s classmates received a similar phone call from a man with a middle eastern accent claiming that he was holding Emanuela cooperative and that her family had 20 days to release Ağca in return for her release. During the call, he also requested to have a direct phone line to the Secretary of State Agostino Cassroli set up. His request was obliged and the line was opened on July 18. Through this line “The American” made a total of 16 calls from a series of different public phone booths.

Ağca himself would also later claim that Emanuela had been taken by Bulgarian agents of the Grey Wolves, a fascist and extreme nationalist Turkish group, during an interview. He claimed that she was still alive but was unsure of her exact fate. This was investigated but police dropped the lead in July 1997 because they failed to find any evidence supporting Ağca's claims. Despite this in 2006, Ağca wrote a letter in which he claimed that both Emanuela and another missing girl, Mirella Gregori, had been abducted as part of a plot to have him released from prison. Furthermore, in 2010, when he was interviewed by a Turkish TV show he not only claimed that his attempt to assassinate the pope was orchestrated by the Vatican but that Emanuela was still alive and living in a monastery in Europe which she was not allowed to leave.

### Possible gang involvement

In 2011, Antonio Mancini, a former member of Banda della Magliana, an Italian gang, implied that Emanuela had been kidnapped as a result of a feud between the Vatican and the gang. During the 1980s the Banda della Magliana had taken several actions against the Vatican City in an attempt to force the restitution of money they had lent to the Vatican bank.

In 2005, an Italian TV program received a tip stating that they would find evidence of what happened to Emanuela in the tomb of gagster Enrico “Rentino” De Pedis who had died in 1990. Then in 2008, De Pedis’s former girlfriend claimed that he had confessed to abducting Emanuela before his death. In 2012, his tomb was opened and DNA samples were taken from inside, although no evidence was found.

### Allegations against the Vatican

In May 2012, an 85-year-old exorcist named Father Gabriel Amorath claimed that Emanuela had been abducted by a member of the Vatican police for “sex parties” and was subsequently murdered. He also claimed that members of an unspecified foreign embassy had been involved. Then in 2017, an Italian investigative journalist published a five-page report about Emanuela’s disappearance. The report, which had allegedly been written by a cardinal, had previously been locked in a cabinet in the Vatican. It suggested that the City had some involvement in what happened to Emanuela. The Vatican has since stated that the document was fake.

Pietro has stated that while he is unsure of what to make of the allegations against the Vatican they haven’t collaborated fully with law enforcement and have generally been rather secretive about the case. As a result, he believes that individuals high up in the Catholic church may be able to provide answers as to what happened to Emanuela but may not be sharing what they know as a result of the negative impact it could have on the church’s public image.

### 2019 developments

On July 11, 2019, two tombs in the Pontifical Teutonic Cemetary in the Vatican were opened after the Orlandi family received a letter and a photo of a statue in the Cemetary telling them to "look where the angel is pointing". The tombs were those of Princess Sophie of Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Bartenstein and Duchess Charlotte Frederica of Meckleburg-Schwerin. However, upon opening the tombs not only were Emanuela's remains not there but neither were their intended occupants. The whereabouts of the princesses remain unknown and the Vatican is investigating the matter.

## Characteristics

* Brown hair.
* Brown eyes.
	+ She had glasses but she preferred not to wear them.

## Sources

* Emanuela Orlandi on Wikipedia
* Emanuela Orlandi at the *Doe Network*
* *The Guardian*:
	+ Article #1 (9/1/2023)