Interior of yacht seized from suspected human traffickers 'wiped clean'

A yacht which is suspected of having been used to smuggle people into Europe from Turkey was found to have had every interior surface wiped clean, a court has been told.

Magistrate Donatella Frendo Dimech heard testimony and legal submissions in the extradition proceedings against three Ukrainian sailors who are wanted in Italy to face charges relating to human trafficking.

Last week, Ilyya Iosifov, 28, Valentyn Mykhenvych, 25, and Roman Koloshva, 28, were detained at sea in Maltese territorial waters on the yacht Vino Tinto II in an operation involving AFM air assets, executing a European Arrest Warrant that had been issued by a Sicilian court just minutes before.

The yacht had been intercepted en route to Italy from Turkey. The men were arrested on the strength of the warrant, which was issued following a Schengen Information System alert from EU border security agency Frontex.

The 35 people who were believed to have been on the vessel are thought to have been dropped off in Syracuse.

This morning a scene of crime officer told magistrate Donatella Frendo Dimech that he had found the boat's cabin to have been thoroughly cleaned. The police constable testified that he had been dispatched to the deep-water quay at Valletta to conduct a forensic examination of the scene of the crime and to take photographs.

“The inside of the cabin, all the walls and every surface had been wiped clean,” he said. “There were wipe marks. “I found some fingerprints on the mast.”

Lawyer Arthur Azzopardi, who together with lawyers Alfred Abela, Mario Mifsud, is defence counsel told the court that under the EAW, Italy was requesting to be given custody of the yacht. The parties agreed that in view of the request made in the EAW, the vessel be transferred to the requesting authorities in Italy, on the clear condition that if the Maltese court eventually decided not to uphold the extradition request, the Italian authorities are to return the yacht to the Malta.

An inventory of the boat's contents was also ordered.                                                    

The defence, whilst not contesting that the charges were extraditable offences, attacked the legality of the men's arrest. The crew had been arrested in Maltese waters on 8 May, Abela said. The impression was that this arrest had been made on the strength of a SIS alert, but the alert was, in fact, issued on 10 May, as was the EAW, the lawyer submitted, arguing that this meant that the arrest had been made in breach of their rights.

Inspector Jeffrey Scicluna explained that, while the AFM had stopped the vessel after being informed by Frontex that it was suspected of involvement in human trafficking, the crew had actually been arrested due to problems about the vessel's documentation.

The extradition case continues.