Updated | Weapon used in Sylvester Farrugia’s murder remains missing

The weapon used to murder 25-year-old Sylvester Farrugia has not been found, a court has been told.

Testifying in the proceedings against Deniro Magri – 27 of Marsa – lead homicide investigator police Inspector Keith Arnaud gave an overview of the evidence against Magri.

Arnaud said the police had visited the site where Magri said he had disposed of the firearm, but nothing was found. Magri is denying murdering Farrugia on 12 February and is expected to claim that he acted in self defence. Magri had told officers that he had not been aware that he had hit anyone when he fired the gunshots from his balcony.

Arnaud told the court that on 12 February he had been informed at around 7:30am that a man had been found dead in Triq Simpson in Marsa. The gruesome discovery was originally made by a police constable who had been on her way to work. “She had noted a car partially sticking out of a parking bay and a dead body on the ground nearby.”

An ambulance crew was summoned but couldn't help as the victim was already dead.

The victim was next to a Toyota Starlet. The rear windscreen was smashed and passenger side window had also been broken. The body was examined at the scene by Dr Mario Scerri and it appeared that the victim had been shot in the back.

The victim was wearing tracksuit bottoms and a hoodie, one shoe and two woollen gloves.

The victim's other shoe was found, wedged between the driver seat and the rear passenger seat.

The rear middle seat headrest was torn, possibly by a bullet, Arnaud said.

At first police did not know the identity of the deceased, he explained. The circumstances of the murder led the police to think that the place the body was found was not where the shots were fired. None of the residents of Triq Simspon said they heard any noise, he added.

A CCTV camera, 35 metres from where the body was found, was examined. Another camera on the Marsa road showed a white car speeding from Triq l-Ghabex and turning to the road parallel with Triq Simpson.

The time was established from a forensic examination of the footage and camera.

There were no keys in the Toyota Starlet and the number plates did not match the car, having been registered to a Toyota Vitz. It emerged that the number plates had been reported stolen in November 2016 and the Starlet had also been stolen in Valletta in November 2016.

Broken glass was found in Triq l-Ghabex, three blocks away, spread over three car lengths. One resident said he heard two popping sounds that could have been shots at 2am. He wasn't sure if it was two shots, followed by the car driving and then another two or four shots fired and the car being driven off.

On nearby Triq San Pawl, police noticed a strong petrol smell emanating from a door. A rag was duct taped to the doorstep.

Police noticed that the house had CCTV but nobody answered the door. Neighbours had told the police that Deniro Magri and his family lived there, but Magri was not found there. He turned himself in at the Police HQ in Floriana.

The accused had been threatened in the past

The inspector testified that Magri had explained that he had been threatened in the past and, after an arson attack on a neighbour, had suspected that he was the real intended target. Magri had never filed a police report about the threats, Arnaud said. The accused claimed to have recently bought a firearm and the ammunition inside it from a Syrian man whose name he didn't know. He had no extra ammunition and would store the gun in a drawer in the kitchen, he said.

Magri had insisted with the police that he had fired the shots from the kitchen window, but had no idea where the spent cartridges were.
He had told police that he had been at home with his partner and their seven-year-old son. After his partner had gone to bed he heard a knock on the door and, looking at the CCTV feed from his home security system, had seen two persons acting suspiciously and had feared they would set fire to his door.

The man told investigators that he had then fetched a pre-loaded semi-automatic handgun from a drawer, shouted at the men from the balcony and fired. The men escaped.

When he opened the door, Magri had found a tyre, a puddle of fuel and a jerrycan with some petrol still inside it, he said.

Sending his girlfriend to take the child to a grandparent, Magri said he had disposed of the tyre, jerrycan and weapon near a religious statue on December 13th Rroad and had then gone to his father's house. Police recovered the jerrycan, still containing some fuel but the weapon was not found despite repeated intensive searches. The tyre was found on the central strip of December 13th Road possibly having rolled there, Arnaud said.

No weapon or ammunition were found, but the accused had told officers that the weapon was a semi automatic handgun and not a revolver. No spent cases were found either, Arnaud said.

In the kitchen, where officers found a mattress made up as a bed, there were three CCTV monitors set up next to the TV, showing what was going on outside.

Magri told police that he had bought the system online but had found it was missing recording equipment, Arnaud claimed.
The accused wiped a silent tear as he sat in the dock.

Magri had told police that he had been threatened in the past through anonymous phone calls. A nearby house had its door set on fire. On that occasion, he had suspected that it was directed at him.

A rag similar to that duct taped to Magri’s doorstep was found in Farrugia’s garage

The accused had told the police that he did not know Sylvester Farrugia or any of his friends, much less had any trouble with him in the past.
Arnaud said he had queried why he had not called the police, he said he had panicked and tackled the immediate risk and then threw everything away, before going to shower at his father's house.

He hadn't returned home because the petrol was still on the door and there was risk that someone would return to set it alight, he had explained to police. He hadn't known that he had hit any of the men.

A similar rag to that found near the accused's door, wrapped in duct tape, was found in the deceased's rented garage. Two friends of the deceased are also being investigated in connection with the incident, the inspector said.

Accused had told police that he knew there was a third person waiting in the car as none of the men got into the driving seat before the car drove off.

Lawyers Giannella Demarco and Gianluca Caruana Curran, together with lawyers Franco Debono and Marion Camilleri appeared for the defence.

Lawyer Jason Azzopardi was parte civile for the family of the deceased.