Updated | Maria Lourdes Agius murder: Prosecution insists victim had no marks compatible with a crucifix

As jury nears its end, the prosecution has argued that the accused's claims that Maria Lourdes had asked him to kill her with a crucifix weren't compatible with autopsy findings that showed blows to the head and blunt trauma

Michael Emmanuel is pleading insanity in the case of the murder of Maria Lourdes Agius
Michael Emmanuel is pleading insanity in the case of the murder of Maria Lourdes Agius

Prosecutors are presenting their closing arguments to a jury that is to decide whether Michael Emmanuel, accused of murdering Maria Lourdes Agius, was insane when he strangled the mother of his children in 2018.

Emmanuel stands accused of the murder of the mother of seven, who was found strangled inside their apartment in September last year.

The jury is to decide on whether he was legally insane at the time of the murder on 15 September 2018. A verdict of insanity would render him inculpable at law and unable to stand trial for murder – although in that event, he would likely be confined to a psychiatric hospital for the foreseeable future.

READ MORE: Maria Lourdes Agius murder: accused ‘psychotic’, claimed father controlled his actions and could hear God

Prosecutor Matthew Xuereb from the Office of the Attorney General addressed the jurors this morning, saying the defence had accepted that Emmanuel was not insane before or after the crime, but were alleging that for some minutes he was insane, “as though it was something he could switch on and off”.

Emmanuel had told police that he simply had pressed a cross on the woman’s neck in a superstitious act and that she had died unexpectedly.

But yesterday, jurors heard forensic expert Dr Mario Scerri explain that the man had clearly strangled his victim after delivering a number of blows to her head.

Not only did he have the capacity of forming an intention but of forming criminal intent, Xuereb said this morning.

The prosecution has also suggested that Emmanuel may have been motivated by the fact that Agius had told him that one of the children he thought was his, was actually fathered by another man. “We believe that all evidence concludes that Michael Emmanuel was sane at the time of the offence,” Xuereb said.

The accused had also gone to the police station to report that his wife was not waking up, instead of calling an ambulance or going to the nearby health centre. “If you wake up in the morning and find your partner unresponsive, would you go to a police station or a health centre, both being equidistant as was the case here? As if the police ever woke people up!

“With the same effort Emmanuel had put in going to the police station, he could have gone to the Paola Health Centre. This shows that the guilty mind started operating legally from the outset. He was so sane legally in his mind, that the first thing he thought of was responsibility.”

Emmanuel, whose father is a pastor in Africa, was assessed by two psychiatrists after being taken into police custody, where he claimed he had received signs from God.

But in his first statement he denied any fantastic episodes, Xuereb pointed out. When the man was questioned again the next day, he started lying, said the prosecutor. “In the second statement he blames her.”

“Dr Mario Scerri said that no mark compatible with the cross was found on her neck. If the defence have rested their case on the fact that the accused was under an honest belief that Maria Lourdes Agius asked him to kill her with the cross, how come we found blows to the head, blunt trauma and the cross undamaged?”

After the prosecution wrap up their final submissions, the defence will begin theirs, after which the judge will address the jury, who will then retire to deliberate. This process is expected to take at least another 24 hours.

Lawyers Charles Mercieca and Matthew Xuereb from the Office of the Attorney General are prosecuting. Emmanuel is being defended by legal aid lawyers Marc Sant and Dustin Camilleri.

Madam Justice Consuelo Scerri Herrera is presiding.

Not a question of evading responsibility

In the submissions made by the defence, lawyer Dustin Camilleri insisted that Emmanuel was delusional.

 “We wouldn't be here had we had a normal person in the dock, this is a jury to determine insanity. We have a delusional person, a person detached from reality,” Camilleri said.

He urged the jury to look at the clinical file in order to understand Emmanuel’s condition.

 “Just because they weren’t aware of his condition, medically, from before…does that mean that he is not suffering from an illness?”

Rather than it being a case of evading criminal responsibility, he said that the point of the proceedings was to determine if there was responsibility in the first place.

“I do not know if there is anyone that is unable to sympathise with the mother of the victim. You would have to be a stone not to,” said the lawyer, “but that should not impinge on the exercise we are engaged in now... it is not sympathy that should inform this decision, but logical thought.”

Camilleri said there were three main sources to gather examples of the accused’s delusions: the psychiatric file, the report by Dr. Cassar and his interrogation. All three were pieces to a puzzle, he said, “a puzzle called delusion”.

The lawyer noted that in his first interrogation, Michael Emmanuel never says he did not do it, but says “I do not know. I do not know anything.

“Is he immune to shock? Is a delusional person immune to shock?” asked the lawyer.

Emmanuel was consistent, insisted his lawyer. “He always said the same things, there was a cross, there was, clearly touched by the victim from DNA evidence…can we doubt him? We cannot doubt he is delusional, but we are certain that according to him, what happened is not real.”

“He said that ‘there was a girl in Marsaxlokk, I don't know her name, but she will tell me who to marry’ - he was never infatuated by this girl, but only said that there was a girl in Marsaxlokk who would tell him who to marry,” he continued.

The lawyer also pointed out that a doctor had seen him whilst heavily medicated and had still concluded that he was delusional.

Just because he was insane at the time of the offences, that did not mean he would get away with anything, said the lawyer. “With what did he get away exactly?” he asked. “Because he is here now.”

“He will not get away with anything, insane or not,” explained the lawyer, because he had to be declared fit to return to society to be let out of the mental health facility where he was going to be detained in for the foreseeable future.

“Justice is there to serve all…deliver justice as it should be done,” said Camilleri, closing with a plea to the jurors to declare Emmanuel insane according to the criminal code.

The judge will address the jurors tomorrow morning, before sending them to deliberate on a verdict.