Former police commissioner secretly met with middleman’s associate twice

Two secret meetings were held between former police commissioner Lawrence Cutajar and personal friend to middleman in the Daphne Caruana Galizia murder case, Melvin Theuma.

Cutajar, who handed in his resignation as police chief last month, held two meetings with Edwin Brincat, known as ‘Il- Ġojja’.

Melvin Theuma had been granted a presidential pardon in order to uncover details regarding the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia in October 2017.

The first secret meeting between the former police commissioner and Brincat occurred at some point in 2019, when the murder investigation team had settled on a plan on how to arrest Melvin Theuma.

Times of Malta reported that the investigative team had no knowledge of the meeting between the commissioner and Brincat, and raised concerns of “possible collusion” when flagged by the team at a later date.

Cutajar was later approached by the murder investigators, and was asked to not to do so again, since the former commissioner had barely played a role in the case.

Despite being urged to not meet with ‘Il- Ġojja,’, Cutajar met with him again for the second time, just days before the investigation team had decided on date to arrest Theuma.

According to the sources, the meeting was held just days before the arrest happened.

“The arrest of Melvin Theuma and extraction of evidence in the form of audio recordings he possessed were key to this case. Holding meetings with a close associate of his just before his planned arrest raised alarm bells and put the case at risk,” a source said.

The date of the arrest had originally been set on the 16 November, but was moved forward as a change in Theuma’s daily routines raised concerns among the investigators on whether he had been tipped off.

Evidence seized by the police confirmed those fears, with Melvin Theuma, his wife and his wife’s daughter all knowing that they were going to be arrested in connection to money laundering.

A source familiar with the investigation said that the tip off probably came from within the Economic Crimes Unit.

When Cutajar was approached by the investigation team regarding the second meeting, he had admitted to meeting Theuma’s associate, but insisted that there was nothing wrong.

He insisted that the meetings were held in order to extract information linked to the investigation, particularly on the audio recordings Theuma gave to investigators to back up his testimony.

Contacted, the former police commissioner said that Brincat had approached him for the first meeting, and did not related to the Caruana Galizia murder investigation.

He also said that he took it upon himself to find out whether ‘Il- Ġojja’, knew about Theuma’s audio recordings, with Brincat denying any knowledge.

‘Il- Ġojja’ is believed to have been the first to tell Theuma to record his conversation with suspected murder mastermind Yorgen Fenech.

Brincat is believed to have served as quasi-adoptive father to Theuma, whose real father, an alcoholic, had been absent from the majority of his life.

Cutajar also said that he met with other contacts in the criminal world, in an effort to help the investigation.

He also said that in a meeting held at the Malta Security Services offices, he had informed his partners of the actions, and argued that his efforts have been spun out of context.

Meanwhile, questions have been raised by investigative partners as to how the matter was treated internally by the police.

They said that Cutajar had not been formally interrogated about the meetings, nor had Mr Brincat.

Sources said that this showed how the matter had not received its due attention, and had not been treated with the seriousness it deserved.