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A self-styled visionary who drew many of pilgrims to a town near Rome by claiming that a figure of the Virgin Mary wept bloody tears has been sent to trial for suspected fraud.

Key Accusations and Particulars

The accused woman, who also claimed the figure was transmitting messages to her, will be tried along with her husband, Gianni Cardia, in April the coming year.

They are accused of orchestrating fake apparitions of the Virgin Mary and making false forecasts of catastrophes to solicit donations from their religious followers.

Cardia drew hundreds of people monthly to a lakeside town, a lakeside town near Rome, to worship before the statue, which had been positioned in a makeshift shrine on a elevation. Over a number of years, the supposed scam generated €365,000 in offerings from the visitors, who trusted their money would go towards setting up a centre for ill children.

Further Claims

Cardia is also accused of making false prophecies, including claiming the figure alerted her that the devil was concocting disasters, for example an tremor that would destroy Rome and the seizure of the Catholic church by political ideology.

Legal authorities in the coastal city of Civitavecchia opened an inquiry in 2023 after a private investigator asserted the substance on the statue originated from a animal. Cardia was later labeled a deceiver by the Catholic church, which subsequently tightened its regulations on paranormal occurrences as part of a campaign on scams and deceptions.

“As paradoxical as it may seem, she actually feels relief, believing this is an opportunity to reveal the truth of the events with transparency and to definitively put an end to all forms of speculation, misunderstanding and controversy,” said her legal representative, the attorney.

Context and Related Incidents

Cardia, who has a prior sentence for financial crime, purchased the figure in 2016 at a religious holy place in Međugorje.

News of the trial came as the Vatican’s religious authority stated that alleged apparitions of Jesus in the French town of Dozulé in the 1970s were not of supernatural origin. Jesus was said to have shown himself to a woman 49 times requesting that a “glorious cross” that would guarantee the cleansing of sin be constructed in the town. The authority announced that the claimed visions were “finally judged to be non-miraculous”.

The pontiff authorized a ruling last week directing Catholics not to call Mary as the “co-redeemer”, that is to say that she assisted her son Jesus redeem the world from damnation. His action was intended to counter the spread of an extreme worship of the Madonna, often on online platforms, that has encouraged claims of visions, weeping figures, and so-called seers.

The former Pope Francis cautioned in 2023 that appearances of Mary “do not always occur”.