News 15/09/2002

250,000 sterling bribe allegation in Queiroz release

The police have monitored the telephone conversations of a person who claims that he can bribe Maltese politicians and the President of the Republic to reduce prison sentences. Posing as a lawyer and phoning from the UK, the man phones Kordin Prisons regularly asking for particular detainees. The detainees appear to be co-operating with the police.

Identifying himself as Dr José Cruz, the caller first approached the elderly parents of Philip Walker, a detainee at Kordin prisons. Dr Cruz claims that he was behind an alleged bribery leading to the release of convicted drug trafficker Francesco de Assis Queiroz.

The man claims that he worked in Malta as a lawyer and as a government official. He told Philip Walker's family that if they wanted their son to be released from prison in Malta, they should get a train to Edinburgh and meet him next morning.

José Cruz did in fact meet Philip Walker’s mother and his girlfriend. They talked in a café bar in a hotel. The so-called Dr Cruz said that he knew that Philip had won a lottery. He asked for 150,000 sterling within two weeks to see to Walker's release from prison. In fact MaltaToday is informed that Philip Walker did win over 250,000 sterling in a lottery in the UK. His dependence on drugs led him to lose and spend most of the money.

José Cruz told the family that Walker had been sentenced to 15 years because the authorities knew that he had won a lot of money and they knew he would pay to get out of prison.

Dr Cruz told Mrs Walker and Philip’s girlfriend that the appeal Philip Walker had made would lead nowhere.

Dr Cruz explained that he needed three signatures from three Ministers and then he would take the release warrant to the President to sign. Philip Walker would be taken out of his cell and flown out. Dr Cruz went so far as saying that if the Walker family did not comply Walker would be far worse off when it came to his appeals case.

The bizarre story sounding more like a scene from a banana Republic soap opera did not convince the Walker family.

Even though Dr Cruz insisted that this was how it was done in Malta and that this was not the first time that he made it happen. He referred specifically to the Queiroz case.

Dr Cruz said that drug trafficker Francesco Assis Queiroz had paid him 250,000 sterling to have his illness faked and Queiroz had only served a year of his sentence.

The first contacts by Dr Cruz occurred in the first weeks of July coinciding with the bribery case involving two members of the judiciary in Malta. Until last week, José Cruz was still pestering detainee Philip Walker by phone.