• Pope visits jail to pardon ex-butler who leaked private papers

    AFP - Getty Images

    Former Vatican butler Paolo Gabriele meets Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican City prison Saturday, as seen in this handout photo released by the Osservatore Romano.

    By Reuters

    VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict made a surprise pre-Christmas visit to the jail holding his former butler on Saturday and pardoned him for stealing and leaking documents that alleged corruption in the Holy See.


    The pope and Paolo Gabriele spent about 15 minutes together before Gabriele was freed and allowed to return to his family in their Vatican apartment, a Vatican spokesman said.

    Gabriele was convicted of aggravated theft on Oct. 6 in a case that shone unwelcome publicity on the Vatican and had been serving an 18-month sentence in a jail cell in the city state's police headquarters.

    "This was a paternal gesture towards a person with whom the pope shared his daily life for several years," Father Federico Lombardi, a spokesman, said.

    "This is a happy ending in this Christmas season," he said.

    Pope Benedict: 'Sadness in my heart' over butler leak scandal

    Gabriele was arrested in May after Vatican police found many documents in his possession that had been stolen from the pope's office.

    The former butler gave them to the media in what mushroomed into an embarrassing scandal for Benedict's pontificate that became known as "Vatileaks."

    The pope's once-trusted butler, Paulo Gabriele, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for his part in leaking private Vatican documents. NBC's Duncan Golestani reports.

    Pope's ex-butler Paolo Gabriele gets 18-month sentence in 'Vatileaks' case

    Gabriele told investigators he had leaked the documents because he saw "evil and corruption everywhere in the Church" and that information was being hidden from the pope.

    The Vatican said the pope had also pardoned a second Vatican employee, Claudio Sciarpelletti, who was convicted in a separate trial of helping Gabriele and given a two month suspended sentence.

    Gabriele will no longer be able to work in the Vatican but will be helped to find a job and start a new life outside its walls together with his family, the Vatican said.

    Pope's ex-butler says eyesight was damaged by 24-hour light in Vatican cell

    Gabriele, 46, told the court that convicted him at the trial - one of the most sensational in the recent history of the Holy See - that he did not consider himself a thief and that he had done what he did out of "visceral" love for the Church.

    In one of the most dramatic betrayals of trust in Vatican history, Gabriele, who served the pope his meals and helped him dress, photocopied sensitive documents under the nose of his immediate superiors in a small office adjacent to the papal living quarters in the Apostolic Palace.

    He then hid more than 1,000 copies and original documents, including some the pope had marked "to be destroyed," among many thousands of other papers and old newspaper clippings in a huge armoire in the family apartment inside the Vatican walls.

    A former member of the small, select group known as "the papal family", Gabriele was one of fewer than 10 people who had a key to an elevator leading directly to the pope's apartments. 

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  • Afghan woman, imprisoned over rape, is free

    By NBC News and msnbc.com staff

    Updated at 11:45 a.m. ET:

    An Afghan woman who said she would marry her rapist in order to get out of jail, where she was serving a 12-year sentence for having sex out of wedlock, has been freed, her lawyer said Wednesday.

    Kimberly Motley, the woman's American lawyer, told NBC News that she was released from prison late Tuesday.

    "Gulnaz is relieved, and trying to slowly figure out her next step," Motley said of the woman, who goes by only one name.

    Afghan President Hamid Karzai pardoned her last week after she said she would marry her rapist - her cousin's husband.

    In an interview with NBC News last week, Gulnaz said she had agreed to the marriage "even though I can't look at him."

    CNN reported Wednesday that Gulnaz was in a women's shelter in Kabul with her daughter Moskan, who was born in prison as the result of the rape.

    Her plight was highlighted in a documentary blocked by the European Union because it feared the women profiled in it would be endangered by its release.

    "This case represents the bigger picture for Afghan women," Motley told NBC Wednesday. "The justice system is trying to correct what went wrong in the first place. The bigger picture is not to prosecute rape victims, and that is a major step and progress in the Afghan justice system."

    NBC News producer Kiko Itasaka and msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.

    Read more content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

  • Afghan woman: I'll marry rapist, 'even though I can't look at him'

    NBC News

    Gulnaz, an Afghan rape victim who was jailed for adultery, has now been pardoned – on the condition she is marries her rapist. She is seen her in her jail cell at a women's prison in Kabul on Dec. 3, 2011.

    By Atia Abawi, NBC News correspondent

    KABUL, Afghanistan – “I am obliged to marry him, even though I can’t look at him,” 19-year-old Gulnaz said about the man she claims raped her. 

    Gulnaz, who uses one name, has been in an Afghan prison cell for about two years. She says she only has one choice if she wants to bring dignity back to her family and tribe: She must marry the man who forced his way into her home, tied her up, and then raped her.

    The man was Gulnaz’s cousin’s husband, and the humiliation continued a few months after the attack, when Gulnaz finally got the courage to tell Afghan police what had happened. Instead of getting justice, she was accused of adultery and sent to prison.
     
    “I do not know why they put me in jail,” Gulnaz said when NBC News recently visited her at the women’s prison in Kabul.

    Her daughter, Moskan, a result of the rape, lay sleeping on a bed nearby – she was born on the floor of Gulnaz’s prison cell.

    According to Gulnaz, she was initially given a two-year prison sentence, so she appealed.  The court of appeals refused to accept her accusation of rape, she said, and raised her sentence to 12 years. They didn’t believe she was raped because they told her that a woman couldn’t get pregnant after her first sexual encounter, so therefore she must have had a consensual sexual relationship with her accuser, they told her.

    NBC News

    Gulnaz, an Afghan rape victim who was jailed for adultery, has now been pardoned – on the condition she is marries her rapist. She is seen in her jail cell at a women's prison in Kabul with her daughter on Dec. 3, 2011.

    Justice, with a caveat
    The ruling and statement outraged many, including American lawyer Kimberley Motley who has been practicing law in Afghanistan for three years and decided to take on Gulnaz’s case.  Just last week Motley helped Gulnaz gain a pardon from Afghan President Hamid Karzai. 

    But the pardon came with a caveat.  A press release from the presidential palace stated that the president had decreed her release “taking into consideration the consent of both sides for a conditional wedlock.”

    In other words, she was free to go – if she agreed to marry her rapist. (Even though her rapist is already married, in Islamic societies, like Afghanistan, polygamy is allowed, with the specific limitation that men can have up to four wives).

    Not the victory many were hoping for, but a small victory for women in a society who have seen few.

    “I think the biggest challenge [Afghan women] face is being women in this society,” said Motley. “I mean, there is no doubt that they are second-class citizens. They just don’t have the same opportunities as men. They don’t have a voice, or their voice isn’t as respected as men.”

    NBC News

    Gulnaz is seen with her daughter behind bars at a women's prison in Kabul on Dec. 3, 2011.

    Motley has been appalled at how women in Afghanistan are treated, but she acknowledged that some strides have been made and hopes Gulnaz’s pardon will set a precedent for future cases.

    “It definitely is putting the attorney general’s office, the supreme court and also others that are working within this justice system sort of on notice,” Motley said.

    Not enough
    But others are more skeptical. Heather Barr, with Human Rights Watch in Afghanistan, doesn’t believe Gulnaz’s case will change the tide on women’s rights in a country riddled with traditional cultural obstacles.

    “It would be really comforting to think that Gulnaz’s case is one strange aberration where the justice system for one particular case has gone wrong,” Barr said.  “Unfortunately, this is as far from the truth as could be.”

    Out of the approximately 600 adult female prisoners in Afghanistan, more than half are in a similar predicament as Gulnaz, Barr said, meaning they have been charged with a “moral crime.”
    So-called moral crimes are crimes that are not codified in Afghan law, but they are covered in the constitution as a crime against culture and religion.  That includes everything from adultery to even running away from home.

    Shah Marai / AFP - Getty Images

    A burqa-clad Afghan woman walks in a cemetery in Kabul on Nov. 23, 2011.

    “Not only are there hundreds of these cases, but these cases send a message to all Afghan women who are facing forced marriage, or abuse in the home, or sexual assault that there isn’t any help available to them and the consequences of seeking help are likely to be further victimization,” Barr said.

    In the meantime, Gulnaz is counting down the days until her release – which is expected to be soon.