Court condemns 'unethical' pre-trial reporting in case of man accused of daughter's rape

The trial by jury of a man accused of raping his daughter, scheduled to begin today, has been adjourned because of news reports detailing the accused's alleged crimes, and pending the outcome of a Constitutional appeal.

In a strongly-worded decree handed down this morning, the Criminal Court, presided by Madame Justice Edwina Grima, lashed out at the reporting of the upcoming trial on last Thursday's evening TVM news bulletin and website.

The name of the accused has been withheld and not published by the media to protect the daughter’s identity. However, a Google search of the father’s name will turn up an informal copy of the sentence handed down by the Criminal Court in February last year, which gives a disturbingly detailed account of the alleged rape.

In her decree this morning, the Judge hit out at what she described as “an example of a lack of journalistic ethics beyond a lack of professionalism".

"It should be known that members of the press should not publish details of the case and the punishment that may be inflicted on the eve of a jury. This is because members of the jury that is to be chosen, and therefore who will decide on the facts of the case, could be seriously influenced beforehand, to the prejudice of the correct administration of justice," the Judge explained.

The court condemned whoever had passed on particular details of the case to journalists, which it said “could not be obtained other than through those who had direct access to that information.”

Madame Justice Grima also deplored the fact that, although the accused had been notified of the starting date months ago, he felt the need to file his Constitutional complaint two weeks before the trial began “so as to achieve its aim that the jury be postponed.”

Last Thursday Judge Mark Chetcuti, presiding the First Hall of the Civil Court in its Constitutional jurisdiction had turned down a request to suspend the trial on Constitutional grounds as an interim measure. The man's lawyer Tonio Azzopardi had immediately filed an appeal.

The court ordered that the Head of News at TVM, the Institute of Maltese Journalists and the Attorney General all be served with the decree.