Police inspector suggests allegations filed against Silvio Scerri were ‘false'

An ongoing investigation into allegations that the Home Affairs Minister’s chief of staff Silvio Scerri was involved in a 2011 plot to have boxer Scott Dixon murdered are still underway and may be based on a false report, a court heard this morning.

This fact emerged in a libel case instituted by Scerri’s former partner Stephanie Chircop against Julia Farrugia, former editor of the Maltese-language paper Illum, regarding an article titled 'Television presenter in court on frame-up and criminal conspiracy'.

Inspector Chris Pullicino testified that in November 2011 Dixon and Chircop handed the police a video in which a Polish man claims Scerri asked him to kill Dixon. The man described how he was taken to Scerri’s house together with a third party, Alex Zammit, where Scerri then told the Pole to shoot Dixon dead.

The inspector said that Scerri was interviewed as a result and that CCTV footage and computers were seized from his home. 

It transpired that this report was false, and the investigations are still ongoing.

Lawyer Joseph Zammit Maempel appeared for Chircop.