Judge rejects Yorgen Fenech request for continuation of compilation of evidence

A court has turned down an application filed by Daphne Caruana Galizia murder suspect Yorgen Fenech, in which he asked it to order that his compilation of evidence continue.

The application, which was filed on 8 April was decreed by the Criminal Court on the same day, before the Attorney General was notified or could reply.

In his application, Fenech’s lawyers argue that the COVID-19 situation in court has effectively rendered his detention indefinite - essentially echoing the complaints he made in an application to the First Hall of the Civil Court in its Constitutional jurisdiction, which he also filed on April 8.

In that case, filed against the State Advocate and, by necessity, the Superintendent of Public Health he had challenged the validity of the subsidiary legislation by which the courts were closed.

The case before the Criminal Court is more straightforward, with Fenech demanding that the stalled case against him continue. The murder suspect asked the court to send the acts of the case back to the Court of Magistrates so that the compilation of evidence against him could resume as he was being held without trial.

But in his decision, also handed down on 8 April, Mr. Justice Aaron Bugeja noted that criminal proceedings were, by their nature, both public and regulated by strict procedural laws, which included the presence of the parties in a “building and physical space defined at law.”

Mr. Justice Bugeja noted that the COVID-19 public health emergency created another consideration for the court to weigh. In order to be held, a compilation of evidence required the presence of a large number of people in a courtroom - parties, lawyers, ushers, messengers, the deputy registrar and the judge, aside from the expected additional presence of media personnel.

This could not be entirely mitigated by hearing witnesses by video conferencing, said the judge, explaining that an entire digital logistics infrastructure was required to hold sittings remotely.

After taking into account the element of urgency and the public interest in the compilation of evidence on one hand and the delicate situation and risk of spreading illness, as well as the exceptional and temporary nature of the public health emergency on the other, the judge denied the requests for the opening of the registry and the continuation of the compilation of evidence.