Bishop Emanuel Shaleta of the Chaldean Catholic community in El Cajon, California, resigned from his post Tuesday after prosecutors charged him with allegedly taking more than $270,000 from his parish, and pleaded not guilty to 16 felony counts. Shaleta, 69, was arrested last week at San Diego International Airport while attempting to leave the country, the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office said. Pope Leo XIV announced acceptance of the resignation Tuesday.
The case has placed a small but historically significant Aramaic-speaking Christian community in Southern California at the center of a criminal proceeding, arriving at a moment of broader leadership upheaval — on the same day, Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako, the global head of the Chaldean Catholic Church, announced his retirement.
The charges
Shaleta faces 16 felony counts — eight counts of embezzlement and eight counts of money laundering — according to the San Diego County District Attorney’s office. He faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted on all charges. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for April 27.
Prosecutor Joel Madero said the allegations are connected to monthly rental payments of more than $30,000 from a tenant of the church’s social hall, and that there were discrepancies in the church’s financial accounts. A court document with the details of the allegations has been sealed.
Shaleta’s defense attorney said the allegations are false. During a recent Mass, Shaleta said he has never “abused any penny of the church money.”
Vatican response and timing
The Vatican said Pope Leo XIV accepted Shaleta’s resignation in February but appears to have waited to announce the decision to avoid interfering with the police investigation, the Associated Press reported. Leo named Bishop Saad Hanna Sirop as temporary administrator of the eparchy.
The Chaldean Church released a formal statement saying the Vatican was investigating the matter and that “all perspectives are being taken seriously and require careful review, proper documentation, and time so that the truth may be fully and fairly discerned.”
The priests of the Chaldean Catholic Eparchy of St. Peter the Apostle released a separate statement in solidarity with Shaleta and asked for prayers.
The Chaldean Catholic Church
The Chaldean Catholic Church represents more than a million Aramaic-speaking Christians and traces its founding to the Apostle Thomas in the region that is now Iraq. It is one of 23 Eastern branches of the Catholic Church that recognize the pope, sharing Catholic doctrine while maintaining their own customs. The church’s headquarters, the Patriarchate, remains in Baghdad.
The Chaldean Community Foundation estimates the Chaldean and Assyrian branches together have roughly half a million members in the United States, concentrated primarily in Arizona, California and Illinois.
Shaleta, born in Faysh Kahbur, Iraq, entered seminary at 15, trained at St. John Minor Seminary near Mosul and at Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome, and was ordained by Pope John Paul II in 1984. Pope Francis appointed him bishop of the San Diego eparchy in 2017.
Sako’s retirement
Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako, 76, head of the global Chaldean church, announced his retirement on March 9. Whether the two departures are connected is not clear.
Sako said he first discussed retiring with Pope Francis in 2024 but Francis encouraged him to remain. He said he asked Pope Leo XIV to accept his resignation Tuesday and Leo agreed. Sako said he was leaving “of my own will” to pursue prayer, writing and simple service. Sako had occasionally clashed with Iraq’s political leaders, and his retirement comes as a U.S.-Israeli war in Iran has spilled into Iraq and other neighboring countries.
Before retiring, Sako wrote a letter to parishioners in the San Diego region urging them to seek unity and “a compassionate, faithful heart, far from the spirit of revenge” during an “exceptionally painful situation.”
“Let the legal procedures take their course in revealing the truth and upholding justice,” Sako wrote.