Sheehan shooting | Zammit insists he only learnt of shots fired ‘after car was towed’

Former Commissioner of Police Ray Zammit has told a court that he had understood a message, informing him that a PC Paul Sheehan had been the victim of a hit and run incident and that the other car “had been hit,” as referring to a vehicular impact and not a firearms incident, asserting that this had only been revealed to him by Sheehan himself at a later stage, when they had spoken over the phone.

The ex-Police Commissioner had been summoned to the witness stand in the compilation of evidence against Sheehan, who is indicted with the attempted murder of a motorist who clipped the wing mirror of former Home Affairs Minister Manuel Mallia’s parked ministerial BMW.

Zammit told Magistrate Aaron Bugeja that he had been called by the control room who informed him that there had been a hit and run and that two shots had been fired. The court heard how Zammit, believing the shots to have been fired into the air, had instructed the officers to call in a low-loader and bring the vehicle to the CID yard. He also gave the go ahead for a magisterial inquiry into the incident.

This was the standard operating procedure in hit and run cases, said Zammit, adding that he had dealt with innumerable similar cases during his career.

“I never told anyone to hide, change or tamper with evidence," he insisted. "The first thing you do in motor accidents is to call for the low-loader, check if any lighting equipment is required and so on ... if necessary dispatch the hearse.”

“When I heard the car had been hit by bullets- that's when the scenario changed in my mind. When I was told the car had been hit, I had understood it to be referring to the crash itself,” said Zammit, adding that he immediately appointed experts and instructed Mamo to involve the CID at that early stage in the investigation.

He said that he had then called up the constable, who told him that he had “fired two or three shots, but not at him.”  

He asked whether it was two or three and Sheehan had replied that he believed it to be two. “He told me he had fired two or three shots at the vehicle and so I then ordered the weapon’s magazine be checked [to confirm the amount of ammunition expended],” said the former Commissioner.

Replying to a question by the magistrate, he said that the first time he had heard that the shots had been aimed at the vehicle was when he was told by Inspector Mamo, who also informed him that the car was already on the low-loader.

He said he reacted angrily when he heard that the car had been placed on the low-loader and told her to inform the duty magistrate post-haste.

Zammit told Magistrate Bugeja that he had later spoken to PC Sheehan, who had given him his version of events. He said that he had given Sheehan a second opportunity to explain what happened, having given him some time to recover from the shock of the events, but the defendant’s version had remained consistent, he said.

“But nobody informed me that shots had been fired at the vehicle when I had been called by the control room,” said Zammit.

The case continues later this month.