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8 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 5 JULY 2023 NEWS NEWS Prosecutor threatened with contempt of court by magistrate in proceedings against Roderick Cassar MATTHEW AGIUS THE prosecutor accusing Roderick Cas- sar of murdering his wife was ordered to stand in the dock next to the defendant and threatened with being found in contempt today after she objected to a magistrate's criticism of her handling of the case. The femicide case against Roderick Cas- sar, who stands accused of fatally shooting his estranged wife, Bernice, continued be- fore Magistrate Joe Mifsud this morning. A court expert was the first witness, testi- fying about CCTV footage and data extract- ed from mobile phones. This information had led to the construction of a timeline of events, he said. Next to take the stand was the Director and Registrar, Civil Courts and Tribunals, Etienne Scicluna. Prosecutor Angele Vella, representing the Office of the Attorney Gen- eral, asked the witness about a request to ex- hibit the records of mediation proceedings between Bernice and Roderick Cassar. Scicluna replied that he was waiting for a ruling by the Family Court on whether he could exhibit the records in this case. Vella suggested that, after obtaining per- mission from Madam Justice Abigail Lofa- ro, who is presiding over those proceedings, the witness should bind himself to exhibit a copy of the application which gave rise to the mediation proceedings. But at this point, the magistrate asked why the prosecution needed the registrar of the Civil Courts to testify. The prosecutor attempted to reply, say- ing that the mediation proceedings would provide evidence of what it believes is the motive behind the murder of the mother of two: that Roderick Cassar refused to accept that the victim had filed for separation. Her reply was drowned out by the magistrate. But Magistrate Joe Mifsud rebuked the prosecutor for making the request at this stage of proceedings, accusing the AG of "sleeping on" the case. He then interrupted the prosecutor as she was explaining her position, telling her that this could have been done in previous sit- tings. "If this had happened in the beginning we would have appointed an expert then and now we would be wrapping up the proceed- ings." "If you wanted this evidence, you should have exhibited it at the beginning of the case," Mifsud said, adding that this had con- tributed to her losing recent trials by jury. "With all due respect, this is not the fo- rum to discuss these issues…" began Vella, but was interrupted by the magistrate. "We need evidence of the beginning of separa- tion proceedings because it was the catalyst for the murder," the prosecutor insisted, her voice rising. "You will not speak like this in my court- room, otherwise get out!" shouted the mag- istrate, ordering Vella to stand in the dock beside the accused, saying he would teach prosecutors a lesson "find [her] in contempt once and for all." Vella obeyed the order and proceeded to stand in the dock, where she weathered an unusually harsh dressing-down from the magistrate. The prosecutor apologised and then ex- plained that the reason why she wanted to exhibit the acts of the mediation proceed- ings was to support the prosecution's argu- ment that the victim had sought a marital separation from Roderick Cassar. The magistrate appeared to relent and in the end did not declare the prosecutor to be in contempt of court. The case will continue in August. Lawyer Franco Debono is assisting the defendant. Lawyers Stefano Filletti, Mari- ta Pace Dimech, Anne Marie Cutajar and Rodianne Sciberras are appearing as parte civile. BLOGGERS Manuel Delia and Si- mon Mercieca are at each other's throats over the latter's claim that Delia avoids writing about Keith Schembri due to a past incident involving a bid to take over the Mediterranean Film Studios in Kalkara. Delia was alleged by Mercieca, a University of Malta academic, to have scuppered a potential deal to transfer the MFS to Keith Schem- bri, the disgraced former chief of staff to Joseph Muscat, back in 2007. Delia was then an aide to Nationalist investments minister Austin Gatt, under whose purview the nationally-owned studios and film investment policy fell. It was this incident that had – ac- cording to Mercieca – led to Delia being economical in his writings about Schembri, who faces charg- es of money laundering. Delia said he will be suing Simon Mercieca, after filing a right of re- ply to Mercieca's blogpost. "Mer- cieca published that response but buried it under a new post saying that I had 'confirmed' what he had first alleged. I had done the oppo- site. I have no choice but to sue him," Delia wrote in his blog. Mercieca claims Delia and then film commissioner Luisa Bonello were pitched by Schembri to have the MFS transferred over to his consortium to run. He says Delia and Bonello instead tried pitching the MFS studio sale to an Ameri- can media company. Delia replied saying that as Gatt's policy coordinator, the ministry had been cold-called by Schembri to take over the Mediterranean Film Studios concession to a pri- vate tenant. He said only a parlia- mentary resolution could be pos- sible for the transfer of the MFS, without any call for tenders. But Delia denied having offered the sale of MFS to another buy- er, allegedly Ascent Media in the United States, for Lm10 million (€23 million), when Schembri's consortium was offering Lm1.2 million for the studio concession. "I delivered a presentation in their office at the invitation of a consortium of Italian film produc- tion companies who had set up a studio in Malta and were seeking to persuade Ascent Media to work with them in Malta. The Italian consortium asked me (and the Film Commissioner of the time) to deliver presentations on why Malta was an attractive location for their business activities. "It should be clear that at no point did I or Luisa Bonello dis- cuss with Ascent Media the acqui- sition or possible transfer in any form of the Mediterranean Film Studios." Delia also denied Mercieca's claim that Carlo Tagliabue, who worked for the Italian media con- sortium, had travelled with this delegation to the United States. The government later commu- nicated to Schembri that their idea to take over the MFS could not be entertained any further: "the Mediterranean Film Studios had been granted by concession to someone else by a previous ad- ministration and there was a con- tract in place which was binding on the government." The MFS's tenant had back then fallen behind on payable rent, leading to a government lawsuit for eviction. A one-time PN candidate in 2013, Delia accused Mercieca of being an agent for Schembri as well as the family of Yorgen Fenech, who stands accused of masterminding the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. "I can only presume he will be speaking with the Fenechs about Arriva and together with them weave another tower of fabrications shorn up by entirely true details. I expect he'll report that I held a constituency event in the Dolmen Hotel when I was an election candidate in 2013 and I got the venue lent to my campaign for free. Or he'll report that a cousin of Yorgen Fenech gave me a few hundred euro to- wards the cost of my election campaign." Mercieca's blog hosts conserva- tive right-wing commentators and anti-vax opinions, and has faced lawsuits over the content that it has published. In 2021, lawyer Arthur Azzopar- di sued Mercieca for claiming that he and Darren Debono were indi- cated as masterminding the mur- der of Daphne Caruana Galizia. Mercieca has also claimed that Archbishop Charles J. Scicluna is a member of Opus Dei, an allega- tion which the Church has offi- cially denied. The American traveller Andrea Prudente, denied a termination for her unviable pregnancy in Malta, also filed a lawsuit for defa- mation against Mercieca. On his part, Mercieca is su- ing writer and publisher Mark Camilleri for libel after the latter accused him of of being paid by Yorgen Fenech's mother Patricia. "Simon Mercieca is a loser work- ing for the mafia and I don't like giving him attention to increase his popularity, but people ought to know who he is and why he is acting this way," wrote Camilleri. "And the reason why I mention him is because he is dangerous as just another servant of an organ- ised criminal group. The public ought to know who is siding with whom." Manuel Delia sues Simon Mercieca over Schembri film studio allegation Academic and blogger Simon Mercieca