Yorgen Fenech's lawyers appeal court decision on trial judge

Yorgen Fenech’s lawyers have filed an appeal to a court’s rejection of his request for the disqualification of the judge who will preside over his trial.

The appeal was filed following a decision handed down earlier this month by Madam Justice Anna Felice, presiding the First Hall of the Civil Court in its Constitutional jurisdiction, which had dismissed Fenech’s latest constitutional case - his thirteenth, not including other civil cases, since his arrest in 2019 - describing it as an attempt to uselessly prolong proceedings.

Fenech’s latest filing argues that because the nomination of Madam Justice Edwina Grima to preside over his eventual trial by jury, following the abstention of Mr. Justice Aaron Bugeja, had been vetted by the same Attorney General who issued the Bill of Indictment against him, the appearance of impartiality was no longer present.

In Fenech’s application, lawyers Gianluca Caruana Curran, Marion Camilleri and Charles Mercieca repeatedly stress that they were not questioning the subjective integrity and impartiality of judge Grima, but whether the court “enjoyed the appearance of independence and impartiality or the objective impartiality required of a court.”

Despite having no legal obligation to do so, the Attorney General had chosen to carry out legal vetting of the nominees, argued the lawyers, disputing the first court’s description of the AG’s role in the process as a “messenger.” 

“It is underlined that the appearance of independence was undermined by the interference of the Attorney General in the nomination process. It is this process which is being contested through these constitutional proceedings.”