'Charge Schembri and Valletta immediately' Repubblika tells AG, Police after damning judgment

Rule of Law NGO Repubblika has called upon on the Attorney General and the Commissioner of Police to "immediately" press charges against former OPM Chief of Staff Keith Schembri and the former Deputy Commissioner of Police Silvio Valletta for allegedly passing sensitive information about the investigation into the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia to the individuals being investigated. 

The demand comes in the wake of a stridently critical judgement handed down on Wednesday by Mr. Justice Lawrence Mintoff, dismissing the case filed by Yorgen Fenech, who sought to remove the police’s lead investigator from the murder case.

In the 155-page judgement, the court rebuked the authorities and highlighted a number of what it described as "institutional deficiencies," which threatened to jeopardise the investigations into the journalist’s murder.

Most prominent of the shortcomings identified by the judge were the "continuous leaks" of sensitive and confidential information that the investigators shared during briefings in Castille, which Keith Schembri, disgraced former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat’s right hand man, had continued to attend, without disclosing his "fraternal friendship" with Fenech, who is now awaiting trial accused of complicity in the murder. 

The judicial protest filed by Repubblika on Friday focuses on the court’s statement that there was "clear evidence" as to who was responsible for the leaks, which besides having a  "devastating effect on public trust in the police force, its image and credibility," could have led to evidence being tampered with, to warrant charges. 

In its judicial protest, Repubblika said that Mr Justice Mintoff’s remark was clearly referring to Schembri and Valletta. 

Both the Attorney General and the Police Commissioner already had in their possession, all the evidence referred to by the judge and each of them were legally empowered to issue charges, independently of one another, said the NGO as it called upon them to do so “immediately and without delay.”

Although an appeal might yet be filed to Mr. Justice Mintoff’s decision, “no appeal judgement can alter the evidence before this court and neither can it take undo what the judge said about the fact that there is enough evidence to charge Schembri and Valletta over the leaks.”

The judicial protest, which was signed by lawyers Eve Borg Costanzi and Matthew Cutajar, calls upon the AG and Commissioner to declare their intention to press charges within the next seven days, failing which Repubblika would be contesting the failure to do so “through every means afforded to them by law.”