A disciplinary board has found that police authorities obtained no tangible proof or evidence that a senior officer, suspended after testing positive for cocaine, had anything to do with the illicit drug.
The case relates to superintendent Maurice Curmi who almost a year ago was questioned by his superiors and subsequently suspended from the exercise of his official duties as a "precautionary" measure after testing positive to the use of cocaine.
He also received a letter from the Police Commissioner informing him that he was to face disciplinary proceedings before the Public Service Commission.
Curmi replied through his lawyers that he was contesting the allegations brought against him.
Disciplinary proceedings, revolving around various alleged breaches under the Police Act, set out to determine whether Curmi had behaved in such a manner as to prejudice discipline or negatively impact the reputation of the police corps.
The board also had to determine whether the officer had said or written anything intended to bring discontent among members of the force, failed to report something as duty-bound to do, acted as an accomplice in an offence against discipline or behaved in a prejudicial manner against good order or discipline.
The board has now found that investigations against Curmi had been triggered by an anonymous report and nowhere did it result that the police ever obtained tangible proof or evidence or testimony that the superintendent had anything to do with the illicit drug.
Result not valid for legal purposes
The initial allegations were based on a dipstick test carried out at the police station. Any dipstick test, as utilised at the police department, could be potentially prone to produce false positives.
Positive clinical toxicology tests were then carried out at the Mater Dei laboratory.
Such tests carried out at Mater Dei are valid for clinical purposes but not medico-legal purposes.
The requesting doctor from the police department had been told from the start that any clinical toxicology testing at Mater Dei could not serve for medico-legal purposes.
For it to be deemed valid for legal purposes, it would have needed to have been tested under particular conditions, including a guaranteed chain of custody.
Without doubting the credibility of the test result, the board observed that the ensuing certificate upon which the allegation of drug use by Curmi had been founded, was issued when adequate forensic procedures were not observed.
'Urine sample should have been tested at forensic facility'
As for the testing procedure relied upon, the board observed that it would have been wiser had another urine sample been tested in a forensic lab or to eliminate all doubt, having the sample tested in such a lab from the start.
Faced with such shortcomings in the procedure applied by the police department, the board concluded that there was no sufficient proof that Curmi had used cocaine.
The board also took note of the fact that Curmi had consented, not once but three times, to give a urine sample without any hesitation, although he could have refused to do so.
Upon the evidence put forward, the board concluded that all allegations against Curmi had not been proved.
Police HQ clinic lacked necessary resources
At the time of the drug allegation, the clinic at the police headquarters lacked the necessary resources and procedures for toxicological tests to be conducted in an efficient and conclusive manner.
Preliminary tests that returned a positive result needed to be confirmed at a forensic facility.
For this reason, the board recommended revision of internal procedures in case of suspected drug abuse by any member of the corps, if possible backed by legislation, providing for tests to be conducted in forensically accredited labs both locally or abroad, thus ensuring clearer and more definitive results.
Lawyers Joe Giglio and Vincent Galea assisted Curmi.