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A court has dismissed a habeas corpus action filed by a man who claimed his Eastern European girl- friend had been "abducted" from his home by the police. The claim was made on Friday by Massimo Galea from Wardija in a bizarre court sitting during which police testified that the woman was never been under arrest. Indeed, it would appear the woman simply walked out on Galea, leaving him oblivious as to her whereabouts. Galea filed an application for ha- beas corpus - a procedure, availa- ble to persons under arrest, which requires the duty magistrate to ur- gently examine the legality of their arrest. Galea was not a person un- der arrest and filed the procedure on behalf of his 'girlfriend'. The only snag, as the police and prison officials subsequently ex- plained to the court presided by Magistrate Abigail Critien, was that the woman was not in custo- dy, nor had she ever been detained. Lawyer Franklin Calleja, repre- senting the Court administration, testified that the woman identified by Galea was not in court custody. Calleja added the Criminal Code made it clear that the habeas cor- pus remedy is only available to persons under arrest, and not to family members or romantic part- ners. Police Inspector Joseph Busut- til also submitted that Galea, who was represented by lawyer Jason Grima, had no right of audience in the sitting, because he was not the person under arrest. Grima told the court the woman in question was his client's partner. "The police went to their home, arrested her and took her away. In 2023, if my wife is arrested, don't I have a right to know where she is?" asked the lawyer. The court asked what the lawyer wished to reply to the argument posited by Inspector Busuttil, namely that such an application can only be filed by the person be- ing allegedly illegally detained. "We are here to investigate the legality of the arrest. The investiga- tion doesn't stop here," submitted the lawyer. "The Inspector says she isn't in prison, and that she's not in the lock up, so the inspector needs to tell him where his girlfriend is." The magistrate said such a proce- dure is not a habeas corpus. "This court is being asked to examine whether the person is arrested le- gally or not, not to file a missing person's report." Asked by the court, lawyer Nich- olas Mifsud, representing the Corradino Correctional Facility, declared that the woman was not being detained at the facility. Inspector Busuttil then called in the police sergeant in charge of the court lockup, who testified that nobody had been detained under arrest there by Inspector Busuttil this week. "The latest one was in October, and that last person was detained on immigration grounds. Nowhere in our records does the woman's name appear." 'I am not here to satisfy your cu- riosity' And it was here that the, already odd, sitting took a turn for the downright weird. Inspector Busuttil declared to the court that the woman in question was not missing, "because I know where she is." But when Grima re- quested he state her whereabouts, the police inspector curtly refused. "I am not here to satisfy your curi- osity," he replied. The court, too, pointed out to the complainant that this was not the right way to try and obtain this information. "If she is not in the lockup and not in prison, then she is not arrested." When the inspector told the court that there was no evidence to show that the woman was somehow involved with the man, Magistrate Critien stopped him, stressing that her task was not to examine relationships, but to as- sess the legality of an arrest. The magistrate, by now quite flabbergasted, remarked that she had never been presented with a habeas corpus case for a person who was not under arrest. "This is a case that should never even start," said the inspector. Inspector Helenio Galea, who is in charge of admissions and records at the Corradino Correc- tional Facility took the witness stand next. "No person by that name has ev- er been detained at CCF, at least up until 20 minutes ago when I last checked. She never was in prison." "This is getting ridiculous," the magistrate remarked at that point. But the sitting continued down its bizarre path with Grima then telling the court that he did not 12 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 3 DECEMBER 2023 NEWS CAREER OPPORTUNITIES Submit your application Further information and a comprehensive Job Description may be obtained by contacting the Court Services Agency on recruitment. courts@courtservices.mt. 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