Minister admits he has granted ‘discretionary’ power to remove court documents online

Malta’s minister for justice has said that he has granted the law courts’ director-general to “use his discretion” on requests by people to have court judgements removed from the public database online.

The practice had been going on for some time on the database that since 2001 has published all judgements by the civil and criminal courts.

“When I became minister, I instructed Frank Mercieca to use his discretion and decide whether to accept requests from people who wished to have their record of criminal sentences deleted. This in respect to the right to be forgotten,” Bonnici said.

Worryingly, he has admitted there are no written criteria with regard to such requests.

“I just have confidence in Mr Mercieca’s discretion and it is up to him to decide if a court sentence should be deleted or not from the database,” the minister said.

The ministry is being taken to task after two law graduates were given a warrant to practice their profession despite having earned conditional discharges on theft charges.

The two students, Yanica Barbara, 28 of Attard, and Thomas Sant, 30 of Qormi, were given conditional discharges in late 2009 and mid-2010 respectively after being found guilty of theft a few years back. The Association of Judges and Magistrates said the two students had been “conditionally discharged and, at law, such a decision is not a conviction”, which means the charge does not get included in a criminal record in Malta, and nothing prevents the two graduates from being granted a warrant to practice law.

But it has emerged that while Sant’s judgment could still be retrieved from the public justice database, Barbara’s was removed after accepting her request to strike off the judgment from the database that dates back to 2001.

Bonnici said the law student had made her request to court registrar Frank Mercieca who obliged.

He also told The Times that Barbara’s was not an isolated case as the same happened with regard to other individuals who complained about negative consequences resulting from their court judgment being available online.

“The court registrar felt that enough time had passed,” Bonnici said.

Former Nationalist justice minister Chris Said expressed disbelief at the decision, saying “this has never even crossed our minds”.

Through their lawyer, John Bonello, Barbara and Sant said that “the conditional discharge they were awarded eight years ago are of no consequence to their application for admission to the Bar of Malta… Stating that a suspended imprisonment sentence had been meted is totally uncalled for and indeed unfair and prejudicial,” Dr Bonello said.