MILAN, Italy -- An official of the scandal-haunted Ambrosiano bank jumped to his death from a window of the bank's headquarters today but police said the suicide was not related to the institution's financial troubles.
Police said Giuseppe Della Cha, 54, a vice-director of the Milan office, left a note on a desk calendar addressed to his wife and two daughters. It said: 'It is all my fault. Kisses to Milena, Susi and Gabriella. Papa.'
Police said the phrase 'It is all my fault' in his farewell note referred to a family matter. They said he was not implicated in the transactions which led to the bank scandal.
Della Cha returned to his job at the bank Monday after a long illness which doctors diagnosed as 'depressive anxiety syndrome.' Bank officials did not say whether the illness was caused by the trouble that was building up for months over the bank.
After scribbling the note, Della Cha went to the bathroom, climbed through the window to a fifth floor balcony and jumped. He died instantly as he hit the ground in a courtyard of the bank, investigators said.
The suicide was the third involving Ambrosiano bank officials since a scandal involving $1.2 billion in bad loans made by the bank's late director Roberto Calvi erupted in early June.
The scandal spread to the Vatican bank -- the Institute for Religious Works -- whose American director Archbishop Paul Marcinkus, 60, issued 'letters of patronage' to Calvi in connection with the loans to South American banks.
Calvi, 61, fled to London from Italy in the first week of June and was found hanging by the neck from Blackfriars bridge in the City of London financial district June 18. A London coroner's court later ruled Calvi committed suicide, although his family now is contesting the finding.
On June 17, the day before Calvi's body was found, Calvi's private secretary, Teresa Graziella Corrocher, 55, killed herself by jumping from a window of the same Milan headquarters.
She left a note saying, 'May Calvi be double cursed for the damage he has caused to the bank and all its employees.'
Della Cha was previously manager of the Ambrosiano bank's branch in Turin.
In the wake of the scandal the government ordered the forced liquidation of the old Ambrosiano bank Aug. 6 and on Aug. 26 the bank that Calvi ran was declared bankrupt.
On Aug. 10 a new Ambrosiano bank opened in the same premises as the old one. It was backed by a group of seven Italian banks and did not accept liability for the old bank's debts.
