Degiorgio brothers' lose appeal against 40-year Caruana Galizia murder sentence

The Court of Criminal Appeal has confirmed the 40-year prison sentences handed to George and Alfred Degiorgio for the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, rejecting their appeal.

In October 2022, George Degiorgio, 59, known as iċ-Ċiniż and his brother Alfred Degiorgio, 57, known as il-Fulu, had been sentenced to 40 years and ordered to pay €42,930 each in legal costs for carrying out the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. The court also ordered the confiscation of a further €50,000 from the men - the proceeds of the crime.

The brothers had pleaded guilty on the first day of their trial, shortly after the midday break, reversing their earlier plea of not guilty.

But the two career criminals had subsequently filed an appeal just two weeks later, requesting a retrial.

The appeal was filed by the Degiorgios’ new lawyers, Noel Bianco and Leslie Cuschieri, who argued that the legal aid lawyers appointed to represent the brothers at trial had insufficient time to sift through the mountains of evidence, after the defendants' lawyer of choice, William Cuschieri, had dropped the Degiorgio’s brief just 6 weeks before the trial was scheduled to begin.

The Criminal Court had appointed lawyers Simon Micallef Stafrace and Martin Farrugia as legal aid, initially without delaying the trial. The legal aid lawyers had themselves informed the court that it was impossible to acquaint themselves with the 11,000 pages of evidence, as well as the 77,000 audio and video files in the time left before the start of the trial.

The defendants had also applied to the Constitutional court for an interim measure, which would postpone the trial, but this was also denied, although the trial date was pushed back by 10 days.

A judgement, rejecting the appeal, was handed down on Wednesday morning.
In its decision, the Court of Criminal Appeal, presided by Chief Justice Mark Chetcuti, Mr. Justice Joseph R. Micallef and Mr. Justice Giovanni Grixti, noted that Alfred Degiorgio was not alleging insanity at the time but that he had been unable to understand the ramifications of his admission due to the weakened mental and physical state he was in because of his hunger strike.

The judges said they could not fail to rely on the findings and expert opinions of the doctors appointed to examine the defendants that day, which had not been contradicted by the brothers.

Degiorgio’s hydration was good, and his parameters: oxygen, oxygen saturation, blood pressure and blood glucose levels were all good, the doctors had reported. “On the medical side of things there are no problems,” one of them testified.

Asked by the court as to whether Alfred Degiorgio was oriented and understanding what was going on, the other doctor had also replied in the affirmative.

Besides this, noted the judges, after having heard the medical experts, the court had asked the lawyers whether they had any questions and none of them did.

“Truly this allegation, and therefore the ground of appeal, is frivolous in view of the safeguards employed by the court, which had not seen and had not been given any indication that Alfred Degiorgio had been in a poor mental state before the reading of the Bill of Indictment…”

The judges said there was nothing censurable in the actions of that court and that there was, likewise, nothing to demonstrate that Alfred Degiorio had been in such a poor mental state that he did not know what was happening when he registered his guilty plea.

The Degiorgios are now understood to be contemplating filing Constitutional proceedings, in view of the dismissal of their appeal.