May 17, 2005— A Portuguese religious statue could shed new light on the aborted 1981 attempt to kill Pope John Paul II and reveal a second would-be killer, according to the Italian newspaper La Repubblica.

Never examined by the Italian magistrates, the bullet that narrowly missed killing John Paul was found by a Vatican official in the open-top jeep from which he was visiting over 10,000 pilgrims in St. Peter's square in Rome on May 13, 1981.

As John Paul was rushed to the Gemelli hospital, where he underwent a five-hour surgery, 23-year-old Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Agca was arrested.

The Vatican carried out its own investigation, but Italian magistrates were not informed about the bullet found in the jeep, La Repubblica reported.

John Paul was an ardent devotee to the Virgin Mary, who is said to have appeared in Fatima, Portugal, in 1917 to three shepherd children. The apparition, called Our Lady of Fatima, was enshrined in a statue.

John Paul often said that it was her protection that saved his life.

"One hand fired, and another hand guided the bullet," he said.

During a visit to Rome shortly after the assassination attempt by the then-bishop of Leiria-Fatima, the late pontiff gave him the bullet, which was later placed in the crown of the statue of Our Lady of Fatima at the shrine in Fatima, Portugal .

The statue of Fatima will arrive at the Vatican on June 4 to embark on a tour of Italian churches.

Magistrates will scrutinize it in the attempt to find new clues.

During the assassination attempt, several bullets were fired, wounding two American women tourists. Two bullets passed through John Paul — one in the abdomen, narrowly missing the vital organs, and one in the right arm and left hand.

However, only one pistol — Agca's 9 mm Browning — its one bullet and one spent cartridge were ever recovered.

"Knowing more about that bullet is essential to our investigations ... . if its size is different, then we will have to rewrite the history of that day," Rosario Priore, in charge of a third investigation into the attempted assassination, told La Repubblica.

He suspects that the second bullet was not fired by Acga, but another Turk, named Oral Chelik.

Acga has provided different versions of the attempted assassination, the most famous being a Bulgarian plot involving the Soviet secret service, the KGB. The reason would have been the Pope's support for the anti-communist Solidarity movement in Poland.

Two trials failed to establish a firm Bulgarian connection. But a photo of a man, not Agca, leaving St. Peter's with a gun remains the major evidence for an organized conspiracy.

Lowell Newton, the photographer who shot the picture, said the man was holding a small gun.

"Most probably, it wasn't the Browing used by Acga, but a 7.65 Beretta pistol," said Priore.

The Story of Our Lady of Fatima
The story of Our Lady of Fatima relates to claims made on May 13, 1917, by three children that the Virgin Mary appeared before them in the tiny Portuguese town of Fatima.

The visions included three secrets, which have been interpreted as the prediction of World War II, the rise and fall of Soviet Communism and the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II.

Right on the anniversary last week of what John Paul described as a miraculous survival, Pope Benedict XVI revealed that he had set the late Pope on the road to sainthood just 26 days after his death.

If conspiracy is proved, John Paul II could be considered a martyr, as the assassination attempt was carried in a "odium fidei" (hatred of the Faith), according to Vatican expert and leading Catholic writer Vittorio Messori.

"This could weigh on the processes of beatification and canonization. In the case of martyrdom, the procedures are simplified and faster. Moreover, no miracle is required," Messori said.

The last pope to be canonized was Pius X. He died in 1914 and was made a saint 40 years later.