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Karl Schembri
The new law courts security system installed earlier this year will not serve to deter the regular anonymous bomb threats that serve to disrupt all court sittings, as the police and army heads insist that no risks should ever be taken.
Last Friday, the courts were in chaos again for more than an hour when an anonymous caller told police headquarters that a bomb had been planted within the Valletta court building and another one in Parliament.
Despite the metal detectors and surveillance cameras installed, new security personnel and tight entry procedures that have upset lawyers and clients for the long ensuing queues as they are frisked for dangerous objects, the court authorities would not “take any risks” whenever bomb threats are made.
“The advice we get from the Police Commissioner and the Commander of the Armed Forces is to never take any risks, even if the system works 100 per cent,” said Parliamentary Secretary Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici shortly after the court sittings resumed on Friday.
“So that means everyone has to be evacuated while the security forces check every room and corner where explosives could be placed. Through the security system we have minimised the margin of possibility of anything happening, but we just can’t take any risks whenever there’s a bomb threat.”
“Thank God all the bomb threats we’ve had were never real – probably they are mostly people who would want their cases postponed – but we can’t take risks where human life is involved,” the Courts’ director General Vanni Galea said. “Even airports do not take any risks despite the heightened security.”
Galea said the callers making bomb threats at the law courts always phone the police control room, rather than the court building itself, but tracking them remains difficult as they tend to use public phone booths.
Lawyer Toni Abela made headlines for repeatedly ignoring the new security procedures and got a couple of fines for his infringement. At the end of last month, he entered from the exit door shortly after court sittings resumed following yet another a bomb threat, in a bid to reach the court registry that was about to close, to file an urgent plea for a client.
He was fined by Magistrate Michael Mallia Lm50 for breaching security procedures, although the magistrate said he understood Abela’s concerns for his clients and argued that a “balance had to be struck”.
The new scanners at the court entrance have so far picked up knuckle-dusters, knives, spanners and other objects deemed to be security threats by the personnel, Galea said.
“The system is serving its purpose, although there is always the possibility of human error,” he added.
A few years ago, a defendant entered the court with a bag full of manure and threw it at the presiding magistrate.
Mifsud Bonnici said: “I don’t know if the system would detect manure but the fact is that once someone who is up to something sees security personnel at the door, he or she would think twice before going in, so it serves as a deterrent. We’ve raised the level of security and we want to raise it further in other parts of the courts, but I believe we should do it gradually.”
kschembri@mediatoday.com.mt
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