At the time of the events, Prince-Bishop Johannes Hinderbach reigned in Trent under the ultimate jurisdiction of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III.

In March 1475, an itinerant Franciscan preacher, Bernardine of Feltre, delivered a series of sermons in Trent that vilified the local Jews, essentially three households headed by Samuel (who arrived in 1461), Tobias, and Engel.

[1] They formed a distinct community marked by their professions and by their apparent wealth in comparison with the artisans and sharecroppers of the city: Samuel was a moneylender and Tobias a physician.

Over the following couple of days, searches were carried out by Simon's family and neighbours, by the servants of the podestà, and also by the Jewish community, who had been alerted to a rumour that they had taken the child and were concerned about the possibility of being framed.

In Hsia's view, "the narrative imperative, the official story of ritual murder, the trial record of 1475–76, represents nothing less than a Christian ethnography of Jewish rites".

Instead of appearing, Hinderbach had an account of the proceedings drawn up to vindicate his own actions, circulating it widely and so giving general credence to the notion that Simon of Trent had in fact been murdered by Jews.

The case was reviewed in Rome, where Hinderbach had powerful friends, including the papal librarian Bartolomeo Sacchi, who accused Giudici of being in the pay of the Jews.

[10] A committee of cardinals, chaired by Giovan Francesco Pavini, former professor of canon law at the University of Padua and an old friend of the bishop of Trent, exonerated Hinderbach and censured Giudici.

[13] In 1758, Cardinal Ganganelli (later Pope Clement XIV, 1769–1774) prepared a legal memorandum which, to the exclusion of all other allegations of ritual murders of infants the records of which were thoroughly made available to him, expressly admitted as proven only two: that of Simon of Trent and that of Andreas Oxner.

[13] In a letter to Benedetto Veterani [it], Promoter of Faith, Pope Benedict XIV recognised that this was the case, but was careful to distinguish such authorization from canonization.

"[21] Following studies on the case, on 28 October 1965 (the same day as the publication of Nostra aetate by Pope Paul VI) archbishop of Trent Alessandro Maria Gottardi [it] abolished the cult of Simon, and the yearly procession with his relics was suppressed.

[13] His relics, removed from their resting place in Saints Peter and Paul church in Trent [it] upon the cult's suppression, were returned there in 2021, together with an exhibit about him curated by the Museo diocesano tridentino [it].