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• The financial police in the southern city of Salerno said Monsignor Nunzio Scarano's accounts had been used to transfer millions of euros (dollars) in fictitious donations from offshore companies. Police said millions have been seized and that other arrest warrants were issued.
• Scarano's lawyer, Silverio Sica, said his client merely took donations from people he thought were acting in good faith to fund a home for the terminally ill. He conceded that the money ended up being used to pay off Scarano's mortgage, however.
• "We continue to strongly maintain the good faith of Don Nunzio Scarano and his absolute certainty that the money came from legitimate donations," Sica told The Associated Press.
• The Salerno investigation was already underway when Scarano was arrested in June in Rome on separate accusations that he had plotted, along with a financier and carabinieri officer, to secretly transport 20 million euros in a private jet from Switzerland to avoid paying customs duties. Sica has said Scarano in that case was merely acting as a middleman.
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• TRENTON, N.J. (AP) -- Tuesday's celebrations to mark the start of Gov. Chris Christie's second term could be tempered by multiple investigations into traffic tie-ups that appear to have been ordered by his staff for political retribution and an allegation that his administration tied Superstorm Sandy aid to approval for a real estate project.
• But the 55th governor of New Jersey has a full schedule of inaugural events.
• His day is scheduled to start with a service at Newark's New Hope Baptist Church before a swearing in and address in Trenton and an evening party on Ellis Island, a symbolic spot synonymous with the promise of the United States. The island where some 12 million immigrants first entered the U.S. is divided between New Jersey and New York, but his party is to be in a hall on the New York side.
• Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who was drawn into the controversy surrounding Christie this weekend, is also to be sworn in for her second term.
• Christie won re-election in November by a 22-point margin over state Sen. Barbara Buono, a Democrat.
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