Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1512265
3 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 29 NOVEMBER 2023 NEWS THE magistrate presiding over the newly-reopened compila- tion of evidence against Yorgen Fenech observed in court that two of the three tasks given to court experts by the magistrate leading the inquiry into the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia had not been completed. Lawyers for Fenech, who is in- dicted and awaiting trial for alleg- edly bankrolling the journalist's murder, had obtained an order from the Court of Criminal Ap- peal last month in terms of which the Court of Magistrates was to hear a number of prosecution witnesses who were listed to tes- tify during Fenech's trial, but who had not given evidence during the compilation of evidence. Several witnesses took the wit- ness stand today. The first cohort were court-appointed transcrib- ers who had transcribed the au- dio-visual statements released to the police by Melvin Theuma, the self-confessed middleman in the murder plot; Johann Cremona a business associate of Fenech's in online gambling company Best- play with links to both Fenech and Theuma; and the former OPM Chief of Staff, Keith Schembri. Police inspector Charlot Casha, who had participated in a search of Keith Schembri's office at the Office of the Prime Minister in the Auberge de Castille in Vallet- ta also testified on Tuesday. He had been instructed to download CCTV footage from the office. Cross-examined by defence law- yer Charles Mercieca, the inspec- tor confirmed that it had been the inquiring magistrate who had engaged him to search Schembri's office. Asked to state to the court who had been present for the search, the witness said Superin- tendent Keith Arnaud, Inspector Kurt Zahra and inspector Keith Vella, were present, together with Keith Schembri "and a certain Mario Galea." He told the court that he had the impression that Galea was em- ployed at the OPM, as he had un- locked the office doors for them. A subaltern of Casha's told the court about an email concerning papers that were allegedly sent by Keith Schembri to Yorgen Fenech. Mercieca asked the witness to ex- hibit a copy of a subsequent email sent by Superintendent Keith Ar- naud, authorising him to scan the documents and send them to Eu- ropol. The witness replied that he no longer had a copy. Half a dozen experts who were appointed to examine various mo- bile phones and electronic devices during the magisterial inquiry into the murder also testified today. During the course of over two hours of cross-examination, it emerged that some of them had not fully completed the tasks they had been appointed to do. While data had been extracted from the devices, no data traffic analysis was carried out with respect to the exhibits. One Europol expert explained that data traffic had to be captured in order to be analysed, and so there could be no data traffic cap- ture in this case because the mo- bile phone in question - Daphne Caruana Galizia's - was destroyed in the explosion. But when asked by Mercieca whether data traffic analysis could, in theory, still be carried out, an- other expert witness replied that it was possible, as long as the data is not encrypted. Magistrate Montebello noted that the tasks which had to be car- ried out, as decreed by the inquir- ing magistrate, were the collection of data traffic, the analysis of that data traffic, and data extraction, and that the first two of these tasks had not been completed. The case will continue in De- cember. Lawyers Anthony Vella and Godwin Cini are prosecuting on behalf of the Office of the Attor- ney General. Lawyers Gianluca Caruana Curran, Charles Mer- cieca and Marion Camilleri are Fenech's defence counsel. Several experts yet to complete tasks in Caruana Galizia murder inquiry, court hears Magistrate presiding over newly- reopened compilation of evidence against Yorgen Fenech observes in court two of the three tasks given to court experts by the magistrate leading the inquiry into the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia have not been completed MATTHEW AGIUS magius@mediatoday.com.mt PUBLIC sector workers will re- ceive a top-up in their collective agreements to ensure they receive the full COLA sum. In a joint statement between the Office of the Prime Minis- ter, For.U.M, GWU, UHM and CMTU, it was confirmed that workers in the public administra- tion will receive a top-up in their salary to reflect the discrepancy between the financial package in their collective agreement and the COLA mechanism. The top-up includes a €6.41 weekly increase in the collec- tive agreements to reflect the full COLA amount of €12.81. All workers in the public sector will be entitled to this top-up. The separate relativity mech- anism for public officials will be discussed in the first quarter of 2024, as the collective agreement will expire by the end of next year. The COLA + Relativity mecha- nism was first announced in 2021 but officially unveiled during the 2022 budget speech, the addi- tional mechanism was designed to ensure that workers in both the Public Service and various public entities could maintain their standard of living by adjust- ing their wages in line with infla- tion and other economic factors. Unions were initially concerned because the COLA + Relativity mechanism was not mentioned in the Budget 2024. They had re- quested an emergency meeting with the Prime Minister on the matter. NICOLE MEILAK nmeilak@mediatoday.com.mt Public sector workers will get COLA top-up Public servants to receive €6.41 weekly increase to ref lect the full COLA amount Yorgen Fenech