Judges’ alleged 100,000 bribe
Former Floriana FC president interrogated

By a Staff Reporter

Although the Prime Minister would not reveal the amount of money allegedly involved in the corruption of Chief Justice Noel Arrigo and Justice Patrick Vella, MaltaToday is informed that the two judges allegedly received Lm100,000 between them.

The considerable amount of money is said to represent Lm25,000 for every year reduced in the prison term of convicted drug trafficker Mario Camilleri ‘L-Imniehru’ by the Court of Appeal.

Yesterday was another busy day for police investigators led by Commissioner John Rizzo. MaltaToday is informed that a former Floriana football club president and businessman, Anthony Grech Sant, was interrogated by the police in connection with the case. Mr Grech Sant is an acquaintance of Chief Justice Arrigo and coincidentally is also an Old Edwardian like the judge.

Attempts to contact Mr Grech Sant yesterday proved futile.

Another person interrogated by the police was a man from Valletta, who is the father of a renowned Valletta football player.

On 5 July the Court of Criminal appeal composed of Chief Justice Noel Arrigo, Mr Justice Patrick Vella and Mr Justice Joseph Filletti reduced the prison sentence that had been handed down by the court of first instance to drug trafficker Mario Camilleri ‘L-Imniehru’ by four years.

In June last year Camilleri admitted to accusations of drug trafficking and the Criminal Court presided over by Justice Vincent Degaetano sentenced him to 16 years in jail and fined him Lm25,000. Camilleri had been under preventive custody since 1997 and the time he spent under arrest was to be deducted from the sentence.

Days before the Court of Appeal was to deliver its judgement the Police received information that an individual acting on behalf of Camilleri contacted Mr Justice Patrick Vella and Chief Justice Noel Arrigo in a bid to have the prison term reduced by four years. The Police were also informed that the two judges were promised ‘thousands of pounds’ each.

When the sentence was delivered on 5 July the prison term was reduced as had been allegedly agreed.

Further Police investigations aided by the Secret Service revealed that the two ‘implicated’ judges received a considerable sum of money each.

Witnesses were first interrogated on 27 July after Judge Patrick Vella returned from abroad. The interrogations continued last Thursday, 1 August with both judges being summoned to Police headquarters for interrogation by a police team led by Commissioner Rizzo.

MaltaToday is informed that the investigations are being conducted by a restricted number of police officers given the serious nature of the crime.

This is the first time in Maltese legal history that a sitting judge is being investigated on allegations of bribery.

Justice Joseph Filletti was not implicated in the allegations and the Prime Minister confirmed that the judge was not being investigated by the Police.