Paceville club incident: charges for Hugo Chetcuti, owners, and JPO’s driver

Paceville impresario Hugo Chetcuti, entrepreneur Frankie Grima and Stephen Ciangura, the chauffeur of the chairman of the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST), are amongst 21 individuals expected to be charged with the PlusOne incident in Paceville last November.

Two others facing charges include two youths aged 17 and 18.

A stampede outside the club resulted in a glass bannister giving way under the weight of hundreds who tried to rush out the club. 14 youths suffered grievous injuries whilst over 80 suffered slight injuries. Two girls were in critical condition.

With a capacity of 200 persons, the club on that night had 450 revellers. At least 34 of them were aged under 17.

An unlicensed Serbian security guard who spoke no English or Maltese, was singled out by the inquiry as having been the one who urged the patrons to leave the club.

The chaos inside the club erupted when patrons started exiting the building after the release of a pepper spray that made it hard for them to breath, and started to feel nauseous and suffered irritations to the eyes.

The inquiry led by Magistrate Doreen Clarke – published yesterday by justice minister Owen Bonnici – found underage drinking, smoking inside the club, inexistent emergency exits and unlicensed security guards, amongst other grievous shortcomings.

The inquiry took statements from 144 persons, including the club’s directors, security guards, DJs, patrons, minors present in the club and their parents.

PlusOne is run by Three Sixty Ltd, whose owners are Hugo Chetcuti, Frankie Grima, Raymond Grima and Carlos Schembri.

But the premises were not licensed as a nightclub and disco by the Malta Tourism Authority. Instead, a licence issued in 2003 was granted to another company, Hugo Cast, also owned by the same businessmen. The club had never been inspected by the MTA monitoring board.

The last safety audit of the club had been commissioned by Three Sixty in 2004.

Three Sixty also employed 13 ‘security officers’, but only four were covered by a guard’s licence – the rest were registered as “customer care” with the Employment and Training Corporation. And yet they wore the same uniforms as security guards and were equipped with a radio and earpiece.

Chronology of events

It was nine minutes to midnight when a fight broke out between 17-year-old Andre Bugeja and a foreign national. Bugeja’s friend, 18-year-old Zach Latif – a Maltese national – intervened and made use of a pepper spray he was carrying with him. The pepper spray spread around the club, causing panic after several started feeling nauseous, had trouble breathing and felt their eyes itching.

Security guard Bojan Spasic, a Serbian national, was one of four security officers working at the club on the night. An unlicensed security officer, he was subcontracted through Executive Security Services, a company whose director is Stephen Ciangura, the driver Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, chairman of the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST).

Spasic was standing by the door when he noticed the commotion inside the club.

Suspecting a gas leak of sorts, Spasic started evacuating the patrons from the club, a decision he took unilaterally, the inquiry noted.

The disorderly evacuation soon resulted in patrons reaching a bottle-neck on the glass staircase at the club’s exit, resulting in chaos and individuals falling over each other.

Faced with a stampede, two other security guards at the bottom of the staircase were trying to stop the traffic in a bid to succour patrons who had fallen in the stampede.

Spasic, unaware of what is happening at the bottom of the staircase, kept telling patrons to clear out. The pressure caused by the accumulated mass of people on the stairs and within the club’s entrance caused the glass bannister to crack and give way.

14 grievously injured, one risked dying

The resulting injuries from the patrons falling off the side of the staircase saw dozens needing medical attention for injuries sustained, lacerations from the glass bannister, fractures and, in certain cases, traumatic asphyxia caused by the stampede.

Patients aged 13 to 25 included a girl who was in critical condition and another who was in danger of dying. The former spent several weeks in intensive care, admitted with near traumatic asphyxia and a fractured jawbone. She was finally discharged from hospital with partial facial nerve palsy.

Resuscitation was performed on the girl that was in danger of dying, having lost a lot of blood, and undergoing surgery.

Another patient underwent plastic surgery whilst another girl stuck in the stampede suffered near traumatic asphyxia. Another patient had to undergo reconstructive surgery to her leg.

14 patients suffered grievous injuries whilst over 90 others suffered light injuries.

34 underage patrons

At least 34 patrons were underage patrons who were said to have bought alcohol freely from the bar. One teenager said she used her friend’s identity card to gain access.

Forensic expert Martin Bajada said the PlusOne was well known among students attending MCAST, Higher Secondary and Junior College. The students themselves admitted that those aged under 17 were allowed in. The bar attendants, DJs and promoter – all students – were not registered with the ETC.

Bajada also confirmed that none of the bar attendants, DJs, promoter, night manager, customer care and the security official had ever received any formal training on the procedure to follow in case of emergency.

The inquiry in fact points its fingers towards the bottleneck that was created on the stairs, as security guards tried to protect patrons who had fallen down the stairs whilst others continued pushing to pass through.

Only one exit

Forensic expert Alfred Vella concluded that there was only one exit – the main entrance – as the two fire exits led to the Hugo Passion club and to another building. A third exit was through the back office, which leads to the Steam club.

The alleged fire exits, the expert said, did not even meet international standards required for emergency routes.

Vella concluded that less people would have been injured had their been other exits.

Inquiry expert John Gera said that several suffered lacerations when the glass bannister broke. Lack of emergency measures were further evidenced by the fact that no handrail had been installed, opposite the glass bannister.

It was only after several had already been injured that a security guard decided to go through Havana to access PlusOne. Not more than 40 [out of the 450 patrons] got out of the club through Havana.

The magisterial inquiry did not attribute any wrongdoing to any civil servants or government inspectors after it emerged that the club was not covered by the necessary permits, but had operated in breach of certain health and safety regulations.