Italian court acquits former Pinochet prosecutor

A court in Rome on Monday acquitted a former Chilean military prosecutor over the disappearance of a former priest under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, lawyers said. Alfonso Podlech Michaud had been accused over the disappearance in 1973 of Omar Venturelli, who had joint Italian and Chilean citizenship. "We are waiting to see the verdict but it seems the court found there was insufficient proof," said Giancarlo Maniga, a lawyer for Venturelli's family, adding the judge had ordered his immediate release from custody. Venturelli, a member of the "Christians for Socialism" movement, was teaching at the Catholic University of Temuco in southern Chile when he went missing after responding to a summons from the local military garrison. A document signed by Podlech at the time said the priest had been released. Podlech, now 76, was arrested in Spain in 2008 and immediately transferred to Italy. He has been in prison in Rome since then. His trial, during which Podlech protested his innocence, began in October 2009. Prosecutors had requested a life sentence. Italy opened an inquiry in 1998 into the disappearance of Venturelli and three other Chilean-Italians after Pinochet's coup in 1973.