Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/554768
maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 12 AUGUST 2015 7 News YOUR FIRST CLICK OF THE DAY www.maltatoday.com.mt Investor demands €70,000 'refund' from Bank of Valletta Notice of meeting to be held in public e Malta Environment & Planning Authority will meet on ursday 13 th August 2015 at the MEPA boardroom, St. Francis Ravelin, Floriana, to discuss the following: (Applications to be discussed starting at 10:00hrs) DETERMINATION OF IPPC PERMITS: IP0005/06/B: Site at, Multigas Ltd, Marsa Industrial Estate, Marsa. Surrender of IPPC permit for operation of an installation for production of organic chemicals. IP0005/13/A: Site at, Sant'Antnin Waste Treatment Plant, Triq Wied iz-Ziju, Marsaskala. To operate an installation for the operation of an installation carrying out the following activity: Activity 5.3(b)(i) in Schedule 1 of the Industrial Emissions (Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control) Regulations (LN 10 of 2013) ("the Industrial Emissions (IPPC) Regulations"), to the extent authorised by the Permit, i.e."Recovery of non-hazardous waste with a capacity exceeding 75 tonnes per day involving biological treatment". DETERMINATION OF DEVELOPMENT CONTROL APPLICATIONS: PA2406/14: Site at, Josmar House, Triq id-Disa Civili, Mosta. Construction of warehousing and underlying parking facilities including a masterplan for the whole Comprehensive Development Area. PA0331/15: Site at, Swatar Training Centre o, Triq Had-Dingli, Rabat, Malta Demolition of existing building and the construction of a new school. (Applications to be discussed starting at 14:00 hrs) PA1505/15: Site at, United Garage Ltd, 66, Triq il-Gzira c/w Triq ir-Rebha c/w, Triq Tas- Sliema, Gzira. Demolition of existing industrial/oce block and construction of a mixed use (commercial & residential) high-rise building with a public open landscaped plaza at ground level and three underground levels of car parking. DETERMINATION OF PLANNING CONTROL APPLICATION: *PC 0046/13: Partial Review of the Ta' Masrija Plan- ning Policy (2006). e objectives set out in this exercise are to enable: a) the adoption of a master-plan by MEPA for the site indicating the road alignments, land uses and building heights within the framework of the 2006 policy; b) to eliminate the need for comprehensive planning by the land owners provided development follows MEPA master-plan; c) to prohibit the adoption of the FAR for the site. CONSIDERATION OF MODIFICATION/ REVOCATION OF DEVELOPMENT PERMIT IN ACCORDANCE WITH ARTICLE 77 OF THE EDP ACT: PA 2610/07: Site at, Triq Gebel Għazzara, Burmarrad. To construct maisonettes and ats with underlying garages. *Please be informed that the proposed PC application may be viewed on http://www.mepa.org.mt/info-participation-pc. Subject to the maximum seating capacity, seats can be reserved on request for the applicant and registered objectors. Remaining seating is lled on a rst come rst served basis. RESERVATIONS: 2290 2018 7 th August 2015 www.mepa.org.mt South African claims third party withdrew €70,000 fraudulently from fund managed by BOV subsidiary MAT THEW AGIUS A South African investor has asked the courts to order Bank of Valletta to refund him €70,000 which it is claimed had been fraudulently withdrawn by a third party. In a judicial protest signed by law yer Alessandro Lia, the man is claiming that he had invested €100,000 in a fund managed by BOV subsidiary Valletta Fund Services Limited, in April 2014. Shortly afterwards, €70,000 of his investment was transferred to an Indonesian bank, without his knowledge. It was only when the man re- ceived an email from BOV que- rying a second request, which would have withdrawn the re- maining funds, that the fraud came to light. The man informed BOV that he had made no such request and asked to be sent a copy of the instructions which the bank had acted on. The bank sup- plied him with copies of the two sets of instructions which it had received from an unidentified third party who had used confi- dential details which the plain- tiff had submitted to the bank, asking for the funds to be trans- ferred to a foreign account. The man subsequently in- structed the bank not to proc- ess any further requests on his account, thwarting the second attempt, but as the bank had made no reference to the origi- nal withdrawal of €70,000, it took the man till January 2015 to notice that BOV had proc- essed the original fraudulent instructions and transferred the funds from his investment account to an account in Indo- nesia. A police report was filed, how- ever efforts by the Economic Crimes Unit to trace the money proved fruitless. The protest concludes with a demand that BOV repay him the €70,000 within two weeks, also holding it responsible for any resulting losses. Magistrate raps authorities for lax controls on working hours MATTHEW AGIUS A magistrate has criticised lax controls on working hours for police and staff at Identity Malta, saying they had led to a trivial inci- dent, caused by misunderstanding queue procedures, escalating into an arrest. 49-year-old Swieqi resident Yinette Consuelo Guaquirian Pedrique had been arrested last month following an incident which occurred on the 15th of June at Evans Building in Valletta. PC Anthony Theuma had told the court that the Venezuelan woman had asked to be allowed to sit inside the Identity Malta offices – rather than queue outside – on medical grounds. However once inside, the wom- an had gone up to the reception desk and demanded she be given a number for her place in the queue. Several other people in the queue had complained, leading to the woman being asked to return the number which she had been given. The officer said that she had re- fused, instead repeatedly shouting "f*** you" at the employees. Asked to intervene by the security staff, Constable Theuma had tried to restore order, but was assaulted by the woman, before he succeeded to snatch the ticket from her hands. The court was told that around 20 minutes after the incident, the woman had gone to the passport office and assaulted a security guard, kicking and punching him. PC Theuma, who had volun- teered for duty that morning after a completing a 12 hour shift, was once again called to provide back up. At one point, the officer allegedly told the accused to look out for the low barrier behind her, as she had started to move backwards. This notwithstanding, the woman tripped over the barrier, injuring herself. She had subsequently filed a re- port on the incident at the police headquarters, claiming that the po- liceman had pushed her. But after viewing CCTV footage of the in- cident, Pedrique was charged with knowingly accusing PC Theuma of a crime he did not commit, breach- ing the peace, disobeying police orders and obstructing a police of- ficer from carrying out his duties. In a 22-page judgment, contain- ing a wealth of references to juris- prudence and doctrine established by legal scholars, Magistrate Joseph Mifsud dissected the offences with which she had been charged: cal- umny, fabricating evidence, ob- struction and assault; and found that none of the requisites for con- viction were present. "The prosecution should have shown more caution instead of rushing to press charges," said the court, pointing out that "a deci- sion on the question of guilt relies on the Court's appreciation of the facts and not the prosecution's beliefs... based on footage which could be interpreted in a number of ways, leading to different con- clusions." The magistrate suggested Iden- tity Malta invest in the publica- tion of a multilingual information leaflet informing visitors to Evans Building of the queuing proce- dures and waiting times. He was "not at all happy" with the way the incident was dealt with by the security official and the police- man who was called to assist him, also saying that the fact that the se- curity guard was wearing Bermuda shorts and nothing to identify him as a member of staff was unaccept- able. This, said the court, could have led the woman to mistake the guard for another member of the public waiting to be served. The court also noted with dis- pleasure the dearth of evidence in the "half-hearted case file" of what happened when the woman was taken to the Valletta police station after the incident. It had been al- leged that the accused and a friend of hers had been sent from the sta- tion to a health centre before being allowed to file their report, but that they had not returned to do so and no incident report was filed on the police computer system. The court, however, also took in- to account the fact that the Valletta police station was overstretched due to a lack of human resources. The court only found Pedrique guilty of the contravention of mak- ing a noisy public disturbance and limited itself to giving the woman a rebuke and a warning. Police inspectors Justin Camill- eri and Priscilla Caruana pros- ecuted. Lawyers Andrew Sciberras and Lara Dimitrijevic defended Pedrique.