OCCRP: Daphne Caruana Galizia is said to have coined a phrase that has been picked up by anti-corruption activists: “Malta is not a normal country.» Are there any aspects of this trial that bring the phrase to mind now that the lawyers have made their final arguments, and the jury will soon reach its verdict?
Julian Bonnici: The political shadow over the case is a long one. Keith Schembri, the former chief of staff to Malta’s ex-prime minister spent close to four days in the witness box, and has been accused throughout the trial of being the real mastermind. He denies it, and little hard evidence for it has been put before the jury.
The trial has also laid out defendant Yorgen Fenech’s web of contacts across Malta’s political elite: his WhatsApp exchanges with Schembri, with former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, with regulatory heads, and with the deputy police commissioner who once headed the investigation into the murder.
