Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1283588
10 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 30 AUGUST 2020 Raphael Vassallo OPINION Yes, people need protection… and no, they're not getting it TO say that 'I don't often agree with Magistrate Joe Mifsud' would probably be the under- statement of the century. And the example I am about to give isn't even much of an excep- tion, really: for though I do sympathise with his reasons for denying bail to a suspect- ed drug-trafficker this week… I cannot accept his core argu- ment that: "it is in the common interest that the courts give di- rection in a society which has lost many of its strong human values." Last I looked, the job of the law courts was actually to ad- minister justice in the coun- try… not to mould society ac- cording to the 'strong, human [and totally subjective] values' of one individual magistrate. Besides: in this particular in- stance, the individual magis- trate's job was really just to de- cide on a request for bail by the defence counsel: not to lecture us all about matters that have nothing to do with the actual case at hand (still less, his own private interpretation of the moral and civic responsibilities of the Maltese criminal justice system). But… well, these are all points I have made before; so in the interests of moving along quickly, let's just pretend that there isn't any issue regarding a certain magistrate who never misses an opportunity to regale us with his own, Jerry Spring- er-style 'Thoughts of the Day' - and instead, turn directly to the substance of Magistrate Mifsud's latest tirade. Bail. Yes, on this occasion I'll con- cede that – regardless wheth- er it was his place to actually make it, in that particular con- text – he does have a point. There is undeniably a per- ception out there that the law- courts have "placed too much emphasis on the rights of the accused… not giving enough attention to the needs of those living in our society who al- so need the protection of the courts." And in the light of recent events, this seems particularly true about the decision to grant or deny bail, in cases involving violent crime. I suspect it is hardly a coinci- dence that Mifsud's statement came two weeks after the dou- ble murder of Christian Pan- dolfino and Ivor Maciejowski in Sliema: and especially af- ter it emerged that one of the arrested suspects had been granted bail three years earli- er, despite facing charges for aggravated armed robbery, and – even more shockingly – the attempted murder of a police- man. Given that bail has so often been denied in the past, even for relatively minor offences (more of which later), this is the sort of revelation that can only seriously undermine the credibility of the legal system as a whole. Even I – who never knew or met the victims, and had no reason to feel any kind of per- sonal connection to the crime – found myself shocked and outraged to discover that at least one of the murderers should have been safely behind bars at the time… and would have been, had the law courts also based their earlier decision on the need to protect society from criminals. And that's just one case out of several: as has already been widely reported, Vincent 'il- Kohhu' Muscat – one of the triggermen charged with mur- dering Daphne Caruana Galizia in 2017 – had previously been arrested in connection with the Qormi HSBC heist of 2010: during which some 60 rounds of bullets had been fired in the direction of the police. In what almost feels like an uncanny premonition of the Sliema murder 10 years later, Muscat also stood accused of the attempted murder of two police officers, on top of aggra- vated armed robbery. None- theless, he was provisionally There is undeniably a perception out there that the law-courts have "placed too much emphasis on the rights of the accused… not giving enough attention to the needs of those living in our society who also need the protection of the courts." And in the light of recent events, this seems particularly true about the decision to grant or deny bail, in cases involving violent crime