Court turns down bomb threat hoaxer's constitutional complaint

The courts has dismissed a constitutional reference filed by a man accused of making multiple telephone bomb threats, who argued that being ordered to submit a voice sample violated his rights.

Richard Cuschieri, charged with making multiple bomb threats at the law courts, had filed a constitutional application in late 2013, calling on the court to turn down a request by the prosecution for a voice comparison test, saying it was a violation to the right against self-incrimination.

The 40-year-old contractor from Hamrun had been charged in 2012 , accused of calling the police and reporting that a bomb had been placed at the Law Courts on five occasions that year, when he was due to appear in court over a fraud case. The calls had been traced to Cuschieri's mobile phone and to several telephone booths.

During the compilation of evidence, police inspector Daniel Zammit had requested a voice comparison test, requesting the court to order the accused to read the transcript of the phone calls received by the police, so a voice comparison test could be carried out.

Cuschieri's defence objected to the request, arguing the court could not order a test that automatically incriminates the accused during a compilation of evidence, but this argument was rejected by Magistrate Saviour Demicoli at the time.

The accused subsequently filed a Constitutional application claiming that the test breached his fundamental right to a fair trial.

The office of the Attorney General had argued that this was not the case, referring to judgments at European level which had established that the right not to incriminate oneself dealt with statements and that voice samples in themselves were more akin to blood or hair samples - to which the privilege against self-incrimination does not apply.

Judge Jacqueline Padovani Grima agreed. In her judgment, the judge held that there was no doubt that the order that voice samples be taken and analysed was not irregular, being a development in forensic science that is admissible in developed, democratic countries.

It then moved on to examine whether the taking of the sample violated the accused’s right not to incriminate himself. Making reference to the Constituion and the European Convention on Human Rights, it noted that the raison d’etre of this right was to protect the accused against the use of coercion to admit to a crime. The taking of a voice sample – a non-medical procedure which does not entail the use of active force - did not qualify as coercion.