Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1514895
16 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 24 JANUARY 2024 NEWS ACROSS 1) Bird known for thievery, briefly 4) Soft-palate attachment 9) Not appropriate or suitable 14) Roth plan 15) Banking expert? 16) Workplace for some clowns 17) Nothing at all 18) Preparing for Thanksgiving dinner? 20) Like an improperly hung picture 22) Gin-flavoring fruit 23) Female inheritor 26) Professor's job security 30) Nervous ___ (worrisome person) 32) Plays a guitar 34) Clothing attachment 36) Yoga position 38) Agitation 39) Bonneville Flats locale 41) Wearing a hidden micro- phone 43) Poker payment 44) Investment firm T. ___ Price 45) Spectacular stars 47) "Vandal" suffix 48) Damaged 51) River through Wales and England 53) Bobcats' relatives 55) Backs out 58) Bit of this and a bit of that 60) Campaign manager? 61) Declining to draw 67) Become mature 68) Middle Eastern rice dish (Var.) 69) Wear away 70) Ball prop 71) Barks sharply 72) Uses an acetylene torch 73) Botch something up DOWN 1) Washington the blues leg- end 2) Questions do it 3) Rudely implying "forget it" 4) Abrupt increase 5) Seven on a grandfather clock 6) Consultants' center? 7) A great deal 8) See 20-Across 9) Like some requests 10) Silent assent 11) Hue and cry 12) Sermon seating 13) Tare factor 19) "Nay" and "uh-uh" 21) Before, poetically 24) Like a snail's pace 25) Play a set with the band 27) ___ Major ("Big Bear" con- stellation) 28) Biden, to Obama 29) Gives off 31) Common Market money 33) Part of a plant 34) Artificial grass 35) Coral island 37) Dissolve, as ties 40) Felled, as a small tree 42) Mr. Letterman 46) Government upper houses 49) Book of Moses 50) Place for cold cuts 52) U.S. flag color 54) Muscular "swine" anagram 56) Like beavers, it's said 57) Look with a curled lip 59) Grimm villain 61) Undercover infiltrator 62) Bit of men's formalwear 63) What a monopolist wants 64) Brief lie-down 65) D.C. dealmaker 66) Do simple math F Solution to last week's crossword The answers to today's crossword will be published in next week's Midweek edition Weather Rather cloudy with some isolated showers at first becoming cloudy with showers locally thundery and gusty at times Visibility Good locally moderate to poor in showers TOMORROW Crossword WEATHER ISOLATED SHOWERS 22 0 / 16 0 TODAY ISOLATED SHOWERS 20 / 15 0 FEELS LIKE 20 0 FEELS LIKE 22 0 THE Court of Criminal Appeal has or- dered the re-sentencing of a convicted rapist, after his lawyers attempted to an- nul the conviction because the date on which his sentence had been pronounced was absent. In 2018, 33-year-old Eyob Melake Eco- bagaber from Eritrea was charged with engaging in non-consensual sex with the woman, detaining her against her will, slightly injuring her, recidivism and com- mitting an offence during the operative period of a conditional discharge. The case was decided in March 2022, with the court finding Ecobagaber guilty of all the charges except recidivism and sentencing him to 9 years in jail, as well as ordering him to pay €3,903.47 in court costs. The victim had given the police a de- scription of her assailant, saying she had bitten him on the face while trying to defend herself. The accused was later spotted and tried to escape police before being taken into custody with the help of bystanders. The victim identified her as- sailant at the police station. A subsequent medical examination con- firmed that the woman had been raped and had suffered injuries as a result of the violent attack. A DNA expert appointed by the court also found traces of the ac- cused's DNA on the victim's underwear. After his conviction, Ecobagaber had en- gaged different legal counsel and filed an appeal. His new lawyers, Franco Debono and Francesca Zarb, had argued that the judgement against their client did not specify the date on which it was given. The copy in the case file had "7 March 2022" written on it by hand. The Court of Crim- inal Appeal, presided by Mr. Justice Nev- ille Camilleri heard the two court deputy registrars who had handled the judgement testify that the handwriting was not theirs and say that they did not know whose handwriting it was. Handing down judgement on the ap- peal today, Mr. Justice Camilleri pointed out that jurisprudence had established that not every irregularity or imprecision found in a judgement given by the Courts of Magistrates leads to its nullity. The law specified that a valid judgement must state the facts over which the defendant was found guilty, state the punishment it was handing down and mention the arti- cles of the law which deal with the offence in question. These requirements must be scrupulously observed, said the judge, so as to avoid the defendant from having any doubt about his conviction. This did not mean that, in order to be valid, judgments had to be free from every error, no matter how minor, said the judge. But the court also went on to observe that although the failure to indicate the precise date of sentencing was not one of the requisites listed in the law, over the years the courts had interpreted similar incidents as the absence of a detail that was indispensable for the validity of the judgement. In question. "The date on a sentence is not unnec- essary formalism, but an essential part of the substance of the judgement, in that it provides certainty about when judgement was given…it also establishes the point of departure from when certain consequenc- es of the finding of guilt begin to count." The appeal court judge upheld the first ground of Ecobagaber's appeal, but in line with case law, did not declare the entire proceedings before the Court of Magis- trate to be null. Instead, it sent the acts of the case back to the Court of Magistrates "so that the appellant will be once again placed in the position he had been immediately before the sentence was pronounced and so that the sentence may be given again accord- ing to law." Jailed Paceville rapist to be re-sentenced after appeal over missing date Judge orders re- sentencing of Paceville rapist after lawyers request annulment of conviction because the date on which his sentence had been pronounced was not stated on the judgment MATTHEW AGIUS magius@mediatoday.com.mt