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NEWS maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 3 JULY 2019 2 MATTHEW AGIUS A psychiatric expert has said that Michael Emmanuel is criminally insane but that it is possible that he had developed his psychosis after going through "the trauma that is the criminal justice sys- tem." This emerged during Psychi- atric Consultant Joseph Cassar's four-hour grilling on the witness stand on Tuesday. A jury is currently hearing wit- nesses in an effort to establish whether Emmanuel was capable of forming the criminal intent re- quired to murder Maria Lourdes Agius when he allegedly stran- gled her in September 2018. Consultant Psychiatrist Joe Cassar who was appointed by Court of Magistrates to examine the accused testified yesterday. At the time he had concluded that Emmanuel had "acute psy- chosis and is therefore insane ac- cording to the criminal code. He has no insight whatsoever into his actions and was driven to do what he did by his disease." Emmanuel claims to have done what he did because there was a "bad omen" inside his wife and she had asked him to remove it, explained the specialist. "The omen had been controlling the whole issue in the family for sev- eral months." Prosecuting Lawyer Charles Mercieca from the office of the Attorney General asked a series of questions which established that the consultation had taken around one hour and that the witness had not spoken to Em- manuel's friends, family or other psychiatric professionals about it. "I basically asked him about his past history. He told me where he comes from, said he has no family psychiatric history and that his father was a pastor, so part of his religious delusion was formed that way. He didn't say anything about his mother. There was no family history of mental illness psycho- sis. He's from the Ivory Coast." The accused was psychotic during the one hour meeting, he said. "He was on heavy anti psychotics at the time. I saw him roughly a month after the inci- dent." Clarifying a point for the jury, he said the man "had delusions, delusions on their own are a psy- chosis." "I did write he had magical thinking…but in African culture, magical thinking can be associ- ated with religious beliefs." Grilled by Mericeca on when the patient had alleged that God spoke to him for the first time, he said the accused had claimed it had occurred when he was young "and still in the village." According to him God spoke three times to him. "A delusion is not a brief psychotic episode," corrected the consultant. "We do not know whether Michael Emmanuel was spoken to on the night of the murder." What he did know was that Emmanuel was on antipsychotic and anxiolytic medications, al- though he could not say whether the accused was actually taking them at the time. Although the accused had used marijuana in the past, which is associated with paranoid delusions, he had not been suffering from paranoid de- lusions at the time of the offence. "In this case there were no para- noid delusions," he said. "I be- lieved that when he was talking to me at the time, he was genuine." The accused had mentioned that after removing the "bad omen" from the victim, he had pressed the crucifix on to her neck to bless her. A delusion is related to one's beliefs. "You can be a high func- tioning deluded person," said the witness, "but unless they get you in trouble you may never be di- agnosed." "If you have a belief that you have a mission to remove omens it is a delusion." "Was he in control of his mind when he acted under a delusion?" asked the court. "No," he replied, although the witness could not say with certainty whether the accused had been in such con- trol in the past. When he spoke to him he was anxious but cog- nisant of what he was doing, said Cassar. Through defence lawyer Marc Sant's cross-examination it emerged that the accused was discharged on a heavy dose of an antipsychotic drug. "It lowers the thinking process to a basic level," said Cassar. Another medication was an anxiolytic to calm the pa- tient down. The dose was also high, added the witness. Taking questions from jurors, the expert said he had not con- tradicted the accused's version with evidence such as strangula- tion marks. "We always go with what the patient tells us…I do not give the patient leading ques- tions, so if I had asked him that [why the strangulation marks] that would have been a leading question." The case was a complex one, Cassar said, adding that the man had been heavily medicated when he examined him. It is extremely rare to see an actual, functional, non drug- induced psychosis which goes away in 24 hours without medi- cation, said Cassar. Lawyers Charles Mercieca and Matthew Xuereb are prosecut- ing for the office of the Attorney General. Lawyers Mark Sant and Dustin Camilleri are defence counsel. Maria Lourdes Agius murder Prosecution asks whether accused's psychosis came before or after murder KURT SANSONE A 30-minute delay on Air Malta flights on Monday caused by pilots' industrial action has cost Air Malta almost €250,000 in expenses, Malta- Today has learnt. The national airline's pilots were instructed by their union to delay flights after registering an industrial dispute. The action was suspended yester- day after an injunction filed by Air Malta was temporarily upheld by the court. Sources close to the airline said Monday's action alone cost the air- line anywhere between €200,000 and €250,000. "Although 30 min- utes does not appear much, the problem arises when passengers have connecting flights and the airline has to make alternative ar- rangements." The airline is still working out the full cost of the industrial action as it prepares to make its case in court on Friday, the sources added. "An expense of €300,000 every day as a result of the pilots' directive would be crippling for the airline," industry sources pointed out. For the first time in eight years, Air Malta registered minimal operating profit last year but this could be easily wiped out if industrial action continues. The Airline Pilots Association has demanded that government guar- antee its €700,000 early retirement scheme at age 55, in the case of the national airline going bankrupt. Tourism Minister Konrad Mizzi has shot down the request, insisting it went against EU state aid rules. ALPA yesterday said it will not be "intimidated" by Air Malta after the national airline filed a court in- junction to prevent the pilots' union from taking industrial action. The court, as is normal, upheld the injunction until the hearing on Friday. The union temporarily with- drew the industrial action until the court ruled on the matter. ALPA said Air Malta's action would not detract from its obliga- tions towards its members, as well as its responsibilities to safeguard airline passengers. The union said it resorted to in- dustrial action in response to the airline management's "numerous attempts to deploy crew illegally against the stipulated procedures, as well as in response to the com- pany's persistent failure to address concerns relating to the safety and wellbeing of its members". ALPA accused Air Malta of "dis- torting indisputable facts" as well as "painting a false and unclear pic- ture" of the current state of affairs. "It is now clear that Air Malta's management team has decided to resort to half-truths and measures, as well as blatant and capricious lies, in order to cover the ineptitude and mismanagement which has become prevalent within the higher tiers of the company." Pilots' 30-minute delay cost Air Malta €250,000 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Muscat had promised to leave the helm of the Labour Party before the next general election but has been facing pressure to stay on by party supporters. Sources in Brussels said Muscat had been indicated as president of the European Council in a list that would have seen the conservative Michel Barnier being nomi- nated European Commission president and liberal Margaret Vestager for foreign affairs. However, the second list backed by Ger- man Chancellor Angela Merkel gained more traction throughout the day with support from the Visegrad countries. This list proposed conservative Ursula van der Leyen for the commission post and liberal Charles Michel for the council presi- dency and socialist Josep Borrell for foreign affairs. Sources said the first list containing Mus- cat's name had the support of France. How- ever, French President Emmanuel Macron appeared to have consented to Merkel's nominee for commission president while ensuring that compatriot Christine Lagarde be installed as chief of the European Central Bank. Muscat's remote chances were also scup- pered by the fact that the socialists settled for the least attractive post of the top jobs – EU foreign minister – a repeat of what hap- pened five years ago. The socialists may also take the presidency of the European Parliament, although this still has to be determined given the coun- cil's rejection of the Spitzenkandidat system, which could put it on collision course with MEPs. Muscat in no rush to leave after missing out on European Council job Joseph Muscat arriving at the European Council on Tuesday