Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1350550
10 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 MARCH 2021 OPINION Raphael Vassallo Isn't it time for another police press conference? OK, let's try and work this one out for ourselves. On February 24, Police Commissioner Angelo Gafà addressed a press confer- ence about the latest develop- ments in the Daphne Caruana Galizia murder investigation. In that conference, he claimed that: a) "With the evidence we have, we are in a position to say that every person involved, be it mastermind or accomplice, is under arrest or facing charges", and; b) "investigators had no evi- dence so far that a politician was involved in the journalist's 2017 murder." Meanwhile, in a separate press conference – held, curiously enough, one day before – Prime Minister Robert Abela assured us all that: "No past or present politicians have been found to have been involved in the assas- sination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia thus far." Both those declarations, as far as we know, were based on the confession of one of the hit- men – Vincent Muscat – who is now the prime witness in the case against two of his former accomplices (Alfred and George Degiorgio). And yet, when the same Vin- cent Muscat took the witness stand last Wednesday… he went on to name-drop 'past and pres- ent politicians' (not to mention high-ranking police officers) left, right and centre. Among other things, he told the court that: "Alfred came to me one time [note: before the murder]. He told me, 'Ċens, let me go and meet (minister) Chris Cardona, maybe he'll give us in- formation. I never met Cardo- na. But this is what Degiorgio told me. He would go to Castille and speak to him. I would drop him off and go. He would then call me about [Caruana Gali- zia's] whereabouts. One time, Alfred told me 'Cardona sent me a message. He mentioned the €150,000. He said there are two groups… they quoted the same price'." Muscat also insinuated that – after the murder, but before any arrests were made – lawyer David Gatt knew about their in- volvement; and that Degiorgio surmised that the source of his information could be none other than Keith Schembri. And – much more important- ly, in the overall chronology of events – it was also suggested that Gatt was aware of the plot even before the murder had tak- en place: "One time, David had told me 'how long is it going to take you to get rid of her? The Bidnija witch'. I hadn't spoken to him before… Gatt would make explosion noises to me, but he didn't talk to me. I understood that the thumbs-up meant that Keith was the 'number one' in Malta. Gatt told me nothing but George Degiorgio told me 'he is Kasco's man…'" If there is any truth to these al- legations, it would suggest that – contrary to Gafà's (and Abela's) claims – not everyone who was involved in the plot to murder Daphne Carauana Galizia has, to date, been arrested. It would also imply that at least two 'pol- iticians' (note: I use the word loosely with regard to Keith Schembri) could have been in- volved to some degree, at least going by what Muscat claims… with one of them even doubling up as a possible 'mandante', alongside prime suspect Yorgen Fenech. Either way, Muscat's testimony certainly paints a very different picture from the one we were given by the Police Commission- er last month. So if nothing else, we are owed an explanation for how, exactly, Angelo Gafà could have been so confident in asserting that 'every person involved' has been appre- hended (when the source of his own certainty seems to be sug- gesting otherwise in open court). Admittedly, there are a few answers already staring us in the face. The most obvious was pointed out by Chris Cardona himself: i.e., that Muscat's entire testimony (or at least, insofar as it concerns both himself and Keith Schembri) has so far been nothing but hearsay… and as such, it is inadmissible in a court of law. Or is it? Because this is another thing that baffles me about this particular case. As we all saw last Wednesday, Vincent Mus- cat's evidence – hearsay though it undeniably was – was clearly 'admitted' by the courts. At no point did the judge intervene to silence him as he was making those supposedly 'inadmissible' claims; nor (even more suspi- ciously) did the Degiorgio's de- fence team object to this part of his testimony. This brings us to another small problem with the 'hearsay' as- pect of Muscat's testimony. Whether or not the evidence it- self was allowed to stand… from a court procedure point of view, it remains insufficient basis for the prosecution – still less, con- viction – of either Cardona or Schembri. To that end, the po- lice would have to rely on more than just 'he told me', or 'I heard that', etc. etc. On this, at least, I think that any level-headed per- son would agree. But that's looking at it from a strictly 'court procedure' point of view. From the perspective of a police investigation, on the other hand, it doesn't quite work the same way. At interrogation stage, even hearsay evidence has to be considered as – at min- imum – a possible lead. And while it still remains insufficient, for charges to be pressed… that would change considerably, if the same hearsay evidence can also be corroborated by oth- er evidence of a more tangible, convincing nature. Take, for instance, the claim that Chris Cardona 'messaged' Alfred Degiorgio, with a men- tion of the €150,000 bounty. If true – and depending on the pre- cise format of the 'message' itself (was it an SMS? A Whatsapp chat? Smoke-signals? Etc., etc.) – that is precisely the sort of evidence than can be properly corroborated in the course of a police investigation. As far as I am aware, Chris Car- dona has not – like Keith Schem- bri before – claimed to have 'lost his mobile phone'. And in any case, the Secret Service is surely empowered to retrieve such in- formation from service providers, as part of a murder investigation. This raises the question of whether the information pro- vided by Muscat at interrogation stage – where the 'hearsay rule' doesn't really count – was prop- erly followed up by the investi- gators. Meanwhile, the Police Com- missioner has publicly con- firmed that – 'with the evidence we have' (important proviso, that) – the investigation has de- cided to rule out the possibility of any truth to Muscat's allega- tions about both Cardona and Schembri… so… um… how are we supposed to interpret that, exactly? Reason I ask is that there are a number of possibilities; and all of them raise problems of their own. Let us, for argument's sake, assume that the police did follow up on those allegations… and found no plausible evidence, of any kind, to back them up. This is, indeed, what I would like to believe really happened (even if only because the alter- native – i.e., that the police de- liberately chose to ignore pos- sible evidence pointing towards the involvement of politicians in Daphne's murder – would be unthinkable). But if this is really the case… what does it tell us about the credibility of the rest of Vincent Muscat's evidence: upon which so much now depends? If this part of his testimony can be safe- ly dismissed as – to quote Chris Cardona – 'an evil fiction'… how much else of the case against Daphne Carauana Galizia's murderers is also – at minimum – 'unreliable'? Not to be too alarmist, or an-