Open thread: was Maciel a fraud?

There is no new verified Maciel news to report today. And the "serious clarification" from the Legion that we were promised has yet to appear. However, emerging from the hundreds of comments posted on this and related topics yesterday, one sentence in particular struck me as thought-provoking, from an anonymous author, which I paraphrase:

"What the Regnum Christi members are refusing to acknowledge, and what I really would like one to address, is that there is a difference between a founder being a sinner and a founder being a fraud."

I often hear Regnum Christi members refer to Maciel as an "imperfect instrument". Well, we are all imperfect instruments. But Maciel is a different case, it would seem to me, because he actually used others as instruments of his deception, as Diogenes pointed out yesterday.

This is one of the ultimate treacheries, and tragedies, facing members of the movement now. Speaking of Maciel as merely an instrument, therefore, ignores the probable malice of his own fraudulent actions. Again - what is the difference? A sinner can be an instrument, but a fraud goes a further step and uses others (and in this case, even the holy things of God) as instruments for himself.

I'd be interested to see what members of the movement in particular have to say in response to this anonymous poster's claim that Maciel acted fraudulently.

(Also, because it has begun to cause confusion and questions, I will try to make more of an effort to distinguish posts where I am simply providing information from ones where I am contributing my own commentary. This is a commentary post. Once I have access to new information, I will provide that separately. Some will no doubt charge that even my information posts are tinged with bias, but there's no eliminating that - I will, however, try to avoid it. Bear in mind, information itself is a scarcity in this story, and I've tried to be judicious in what I pass on.)