Attempted murder jury: Lack of homicidal intent 'staring us in the face'

The defence counsel for retired policeman Carmel Cutajar, has implored the jury trying his client for attempted murder to give him the punishment he was due but not to add further torment to that which he had already suffered.

Cutajar’s attempted murder trial continued yesterday, the jury having had a few hours of sleep to digest an admission by the defendant’s wife – the victim of the shooting – who on Friday afternoon revealed that she had repeatedly lied under oath about having an extramarital affair, in the four years since the incident.

Cutajar, as well as some jurors, were seen wiping away tears as defence lawyer Edward Gatt delivered a powerful and emotive closing address to the jury, arguing that the unfaithful wife had eroded the man’s sanity and left him an emotional wreck.

“Maria Cutajar destroyed her husband emotionally, betraying him with another man and then labelling him as jealous because of his suspicions. When she deprived him of his children and turned them against him, having lied to them and claiming that he would beat her, he finally snapped,” Gatt said. “Let him answer for what he did, but that he wanted to kill her is a lie.”

Cutajar, 51, from Rabat, is pleading not guilty to attempted murder, grievously injuring his wife, carrying an unlicensed firearm and committing a crime he was duty bound to prevent. He was arrested on 26 September 2012 after going to the Point De Vue guesthouse in Rabat where the victim worked, and shooting her in the torso before turning the gun on himself.

“Is anyone saying that you have a right to hurt a woman who is committing adultery? This is definitely not the case. But if what she is doing is wearing down your mental faculties, then this must be taken into consideration,” Gatt told the jury.

He said that while Maria Cutajar had alleged that the accused would beat her regularly, she had never reported the alleged beatings to the police – as her husband was himself a police officer.

“You don’t go to the police because he’s a policeman. But wouldn’t you then go to a doctor? Can I believe this woman? Does ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ emerge?”

The lawyer argued that the woman’s adultery was relevant, saying she had created a story about the accused, carrying out “a character assassination exercise, alleging that he did things which in fact he didn’t, to hide her own misdeeds.”

Gatt said Maria Cutajar had finally admitted to having perjured herself on this matter. “So the Attorney General is going to ask you to believe a story given to you by a person who lied before the inquiring magistrate,” he continued.

Gatt defended the mental state of the defendant, whom he

“If you are told that someone is going to call you and two hours later the call still hasn’t come, you can be expected to begin speculating as to what happened. Now put yourselves in this man’s shoes, with the backstory that you have come to know.

“This man found himself in a situation where he is almost subject to medical care. You come home to find your things missing, your children telling you that they don’t want to speak to you. When adultery puts you in this situation, can you behave as a normal person? After this plot by your wife, can you behave properly? The realities of life tell you that you can’t!”

Gatt argued this had rendered the intentional component – the criminal intent to commit wilful homicide – absent.

The fact that he did not go there to kill was “staring us in the face” Gatt said in a raised voice. “If there was something both of them agreed here, it was that the argument was about the children. She told him that the children did not want to see him, not even the youngest. Does it make sense that this would lead to a homicidal intent?”

“Did we see any threats in the SMS he sent? Flowers, love, invitations to dinner. Can we speak of homicidal intent?”

Gatt even argued that the accused had the option of using his service Glock – a lethal weapon – but chose instead to “use an antique firearm that he kept as a keepsake of his father.”

He urged the jury to piece the jigsaw together themselves, decrying an apparent conspiracy to cover up the existence of the wife’s lover, Stephen ‘il-maws’, by Maria Cutajar and her workmates. “They described her as shaken when she saw the accused there – now we know why she wanted to leave as soon as the clock struck one. She had the other guy waiting for her!”

All medical experts who testified had reported the accused as being reconciliatory. Six days after admission to Mount Carmel Hospital, psychiatrist Dr Jean Pierre  Giorgio reported no thoughts of self-harm or harming others. In their analysis, three court-appointed psychiatrists reported “no thoughts of homicidal ideation... never had any thoughts of harming anyone”.

Reading from the heavily bookmarked court transcript of the testimony of the first policeman who spoke to the accused, Gatt said how Cutajar was reported to be in an agitated state. “The ambulance nurse testified to seeing him white as a sheet and sweating profusely. Dr Giorgio, six days later, found him agitated and concerned about his wife’s health.”

He called on the jury to look at these aspects before accepting the AG’s thesis. “I accept that he wanted to hurt her, to cause grievous injury. That is all he wanted to do. He was so angry... and he was in the situation he was, because she had put him in it. All this talk of pathological jealousy... it was not a delusion after all.”

The trial continues.

Ms Justice Edwina Grima is presiding. Lawyers Giannella Busuttil and Anthony Vella are prosecuting. Lawyers Edward Gatt and Mark Vassallo are defence counsel.