An Italian court’s decision last October, which defendants in the Vatican’s finance trial hailed as a vindication of their cause, was actually a mixed result, a Pillar analysis shows.

The Italian court had quashed an arrest warrant for Gianluigi Torzi, a key figure in the Vatican case, and the defendant’s lawyers had said that the decision favored their argument that Torzi faced unfair prosecution in the Vatican trial. But in fact the court—whose decision only recently was made public—found that argument “without foundation.”

The court’s decision was based on procedural grounds, Pillar explains. The full decision does not entirely favor the Vatican prosecutors, but shows that Torzi’s defense will be based on a claim that the Vatican tribunal does not provide adequate protection for defendants.