Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/392875
19 Constitutional Court rulings. As things stand, the only visible concession that something is even amiss came last August, when the law was amended to allow suspects to 'challenge' the same unconstitutional Attorney General's discretion in court. Wonderful solution, eh? We can now 'challenge' the Attorney General whenever he breaks international law by violating our human rights. He can still violate them, of course…. all we can do is initiate another long judicial proceeding to remind him, and the country in general, that the underlying flaw in this system has once again not been addressed. This brings us to the second case I mentioned in the opening paragraph: and the first to actually invoke the August amendment. Last Thursday, Mr Justice Michael Mallia held that Emmanuel Magri, accused of importing and trafficking heroin in 2003 (yup, that's right: 11 years ago…) was not to stand trial by jury, as originally intended by the Attorney General, but in the magistrates' court. Again, the judge cited the same case law to conclude that the practice in question is illegal. Wow, that's a shocker, isn't it? Who would have ever guessed, that after multiple rulings by the highest courts in Malta and Europe, the local Criminal Court would finally get it into its head that the discretion used by the AG in the Holmes, Camilleri, Dimech/Lebrun and other cases was (as I grow weary of repeating) unconstitutional, and a direct violation of the human rights charter? Yet the AG remains free to exercise that discretion even now. So I suppose the next 20 cases brought forward on the same complaint will likewise reach the same conclusion… and still the law will remain unchanged. The exact same principle applies to the legal assistance argument, too. Since 2009 the police have adopted new procedures to address this lacuna; but (as several cases have since revealed) the sort of assistance actually permitted does not really meet the criteria laid down in Article 6 of the Human Rights Convention. So again, the same question arises: how many times must the court rule that this is not in conformity with the basic principles of law, before the law finally gets amended to reflect those basic principles? At which point, I feel I must cut the law courts some slack (hey, the Chief Justice gets terribly upset when journalists criticise his precious justice system. You wouldn't want me to upset him, now would you?). What these cases collectively also show is that from the judiciary's point of view, there is at least cognisance that this situation is flawed and has to be rectified. They have in fact made that point some half a dozen times in the past year alone. So where is the machine of justice actually getting stuck, if not at the law courts? Hmm, I wonder. Let's just say that all present indications point towards a large, unfinished building on stilts, slap bang at the entrance to our capital city, facing a statue of a horse with a missing leg… maltatoday, SUNDAY, 5 OCTOBER 2014 take to change a law? Welsh national Daniel Holmes (inset) is currently serving an 11 year sentence, confirmed on appeal, for cultivation of marijuana. Pictured: protesters at a 'Free Daniel Holmes' rally in Valletta, 2013