'You’ll see what I’m capable of’, alleged Bidnija killer told victim
Jean Paul Busuttil's wife testifies about seeing accused shooting him 'point blank'
Updated 12.50pm
A man accused of murder following what police described as an incident of road rage told his victim “you’ll see what I’m capable of” before speeding off to fetch his gun, a court heard on Wednesday.
Mohamed Hamdan, 46 and with a history of violent crime, stands accused of killing Jean Paul Busuttil following a collision between the two early on a Sunday morning on a country lane in Bidnija in June.
He is pleading not guilty to all charges.
CCTV cameras in the neighbourhood picked up audio of the incident and a police inspector told the court that a man could be heard yelling in Maltese “stay down, you li**,” right after gunshots were fired.
Busuttil’s foreign-born wife, who witnessed the incident and said she understands Maltese, testified that Hamdan yelled “I hope you die,” after shooting him.
Inspector Kurt Colombo Zahra said Hamdan had initially confirmed to police officers that shot Busuttil, adding “Who did this guy think he was? Did he think he was going to run me over? I showed him who would run over who.”
He initially refused legal representation, saying “God is my lawyer”.
Hamdan and Busuttil both lived in Bidnija but there was no indication that they knew each other, the court heard, and their first known encounter occurred on that fateful Sunday morning of June 29.
Busuttil, his wife and mother-in-law were en route to Żebbuġ to watch their daughter play volleyball. A few minutes into the drive, they collided with a motorcyclist who was driving the wrong way down the one-way country lane.
A crash turns violent
Busuttil’s wife testified that the motorcyclist, who she identified as the accused, was “very aggressive”. A police officer who happened to be passing by called a LESA warden to the scene.
The warden arrived around 20 minutes later, with a third party later identified as Hamdan’s son also arriving on the scene at around the same time.
Inspector Colombo Zahra told the court that according to the warden, Busuttil and Hamdan got into a verbal argument over the collision.
The warden tried to get Hamdan’s version of events privately, but Busuttil approached them. Hamdan’s son intervened and Hamdan told Busuttil “Just wait, you’ll soon see who I am. You’ll see what I’m capable of” [Stennieni, dalwaqt tkun taf min jien. Taħseb li ma nasalx jien?]
He then sped off on his son’s motorcycle and returned a few minutes later. The warden recalled Hamdan telling him to “get out of the way” before firing shots at Busuttil.
Busuttil’s wife told the court that Hamdan’s son got agitated when the accused sped off, telling the warden “Stop him, stop him, he is mad and going to do something bad.”
Her husband seemed to suspect things were going to turn ugly, telling her to get back into the car because “I’m not trusting this guy.”
Hamdan shot her husband “point blank” five times, hitting him in the neck, cheek and body, his wife testified.
Busuttil was still standing but “the look in his eyes was gone,” she recalled. She and her mother bundled him into the back seat of the car before driving towards hospital. On the way, they came across an ambulance and stopped it.
Busuttil was given first aid and rushed to hospital but died two hours later.
The case will continue on July 14.
Magistrate Astrid May Grima presided over the court.
Attorney General lawyers Mauro Abela and Kaylie Bonett prosecuted.
Lawyers Edward Gatt, Mario and Nicholas Mifsud represented Hamdan.
Lawyers Arthur Azzopardi, Jacob Magri and David Farrugia Sacco appeared for the victim’s family.
As it happened
Case adjourned to July 14
12.34pm The defence says it does not intend to contest the prima facie case against their client.
Other civil witnesses, including the victim's mother-in-law and the LESA warden who witnessed the crime, will testify at a future sitting.
The case is adjourned to July 14 at noon.
'My husband was really calm'
12.19pm Answering questions from lawyer Arthur Azzopardi, she says her husband was “really calm” with his arms crossed as they waited for the warden to arrive. The accused, on the other hand, was pacing up and down, swearing on his phone.
Her husband did not exchange any words with the third party who arrived on the scene [Hamdan’s son] and she did not hear Hamdan and his son speaking.
She did, however, see Hamdan shove his son before driving off on his motorcycle.
She says she has been in Malta for 33 years and was married to Jean Paul Busuttil for 29.
Flagging down an ambulance
12.06pm She drove up the road near it-Telgħa t’Alla u Ommu towards San Ġwann, heading to Mater Dei Hospital. An ambulance drove past. She did a U-turn, chased after it and flagged it down.
Paramedics got to work. Other ambulances and doctors were called to the scene and he was rushed to hospital.
Two hours later, he was pronounced dead.
His wife is sobbing as she recalls it all.
'I hope you die'
12pm Hamdan returned around five to seven minutes later.
“He parked his bike, walked up to my husband… and shot him point blank five times,” she testifies.
She says she heard Hamdan tell her husband the equivalent of “I hope you die, you bastard” in Maltese after he fired the shots.
“I cannot repeat what he said, I understand Maltese but cannot repeat,” she said.
Her husband was wounded in his neck, cheek and body, she says between sobs. She and her mother got her husband into the back seat of the car, she moved the motorcycle out of the way and then started driving towards hospital. She thinks the accused had already left the scene.
“Jean was still standing up, his gaze… the look in his eyes was gone,” she says.
'I am not trusting this person'
11.55am Busuttil’s wife says Hamdan’s son had an inkling something bad was going to happen. Hamdan shoved his son out of the way and drove off on a motorcycle.
The son then told the warden “Stop him, stop him, he is mad and going to do something bad.”
She says her husband told her to get back into the car because “I am not trusting this person”. She did that and kept watch of the situation from the visor mirror.
Accused was 'very aggressive'
11.41am Busuttil begins her testimony.
She, her husband and mother left their home at around 6.45am that morning to go and watch their daughter play volleyball in Zebbug. She was seated in the passenger seat, her husband was driving and her mother was seated behind him.
They took a country road because there were roadworks on the main road. About five minutes into the drive, the collision happened. A man drove up the one-way road on a motorcycle. Her husband stopped the car and signalled for the man to stop, but he did not and just collided with the car.
She took photos of the motorcycle. A police officer happened to pass by, and he seemed to know the motorcyclist, she testifies.
“Mohamed, what did you do?” the police officer asked him.
She says they asked the police officer to handle the collision paperwork as they wanted to make it in time for their daughter’s volleyball match. But the officer said it wasn’t his jurisdiction and called for a LESA warden.
When the officer left, Hamdan became “very aggressive” and “did not stop swearing,” she testifies. The magistrate asks for more detail and she replies that his “body language” was aggressive.
“He probably did not do anything to my husband because he was a very big man,” she adds.
It took a warden around 20 minutes to arrive, she says, and the warden arrived at around the same time another person she did not know got there on another motorbike.
During the 20-minute wait, she and her husband stood by the car. Hamdan was swearing [“bad words in Maltese”] and calling people. Some of the swearing was directed at her husband, she says.
Victim's wife to testify
11.19am Busuttil’s widowed wife, Maria Mirjam Busuttil, will testify via videolink from a separate room in the law courts building. She will testify in English.
Hamdan's anger at 'capitalists'
11.15am Lawyer Arthur Azzopardi, who is representing the victim’s family, asks about the Busuttil and Hamdan not knowing each other.
The inspector confirms there’s no indication that they did. Hamdan, however, told the police that Busuttil was a “capitalist who thinks he can do what he wants because he has power.” He also spoke generically about capitalism.
Defence lawyer Mario Mifsud implies it took the warden more than an hour and a half to reach the scene. The inspector says that’s definitely not possible but he’d need to check the details.
Defence lawyer Edward Gatt asks if anything else was heard on the distant CCTV camera.
The inspector says the heated conversation between the two can be heard and it will be more audible following audio enhancements.
The collision is not visible on the footage, the inspector says.
Gatt suggests Busuttil had driven onto Hamdan’s motorcycle. The inspector says Hamdan said in his statement “What should I do, let him ride over me?” but that could not be corroborated.
No indication Busuttil and Hamdan knew each other
10.59am While Busuttil and Hamdan lived close to each other, there is no indication that they knew each other or had any previous relationship, a prosecutor tells the court. Hamdan moved to the area a few months ago and was renting.
CCTV audio picked up gunfire
10.57am CCTV cameras in the area provide clear audio of the gunshots, the court is told.
Cameras picked up sounds of a heated argument at 7.26am. Two minutes later, a camera near Hamdan’s house shows him parking outside. He enters and returns after less than a minute.
At 7.31am, the argument can be heard getting more heated.
Fifteen seconds later, cameras pick up the sound of gunshots. A man can be heard saying “move”, corroborating the warden’s recollection, followed by gunfire ['pah, pah' the inspector recounts] and a man swearing.
"Stay down, you li**," the man can be heard saying.
What Hamdan told police
10.54am Hamdan was being held at police headquarters, Inspector Colombo Zahra testifies.
When he was asked if he wanted legal assistance, Hamdan replied “God is my lawyer”.
He confirmed, multiple times, that he had shot Busuttil.
“Who did this guy think he was? Did he think he was going to steamroll me? I showed him who would steamroll who,” the inspector says Hamdan said. [“Min ħaseb li hu dan, ħaseb li ha jgħaddi minn fuq kulħadd. Urejtu min se jgħaddi min fuq min.]
Hamdan refused to provide swabs, fingerprints or a urine sample. He called his wife and at that stage appointed a lawyer.
He was then interrogated in the presence of his lawyer on June 30. He told police that he was “angry at the state” and that Maltese “are all one family”. He also implied that Busuttil had threatened to beat up his son during the altercation.
What the mother-in-law saw
10.45am Hamdan’s son initially declined to answer police questions about the incident.
Busuttil’s mother-in-law, who was in the car at the time of the incident, told police that they were going to watch Busuttil’s daughter at a volleyball marathon.
She told police that around 6.30am a motorcyclist had collided with them and then acted aggressively.
Hamdan had also shoved his own son out of the way before leaving the scene, she said, and then driven off on the son’s motorcycle.
The mother-in-law recalled hearing five gunshots. Busuttil tried to run back to the car after the first shot. When she and her daughter [Busuttil’s wife] got out to help him, Hamdan threw a running shoe [slipper] at them.
Cutting the reeds and a CCTV hunt
10.41am Police then started to search the area, in the hope of finding the murder weapon. The area where Hamdan was seen wandering off to was full of reeds and police had to get the field owner’s permission to cut those reeds down.
Meanwhile, they also took note of CCTV cameras in the area that could help in the investigation. The gunshot can be heard clearly on various cameras in the area, the inspector says.
Busuttil's wife flagged down ambulance
10.32am Busuttil’s wife and mother-in-law managed to get him into the Volvo. His wife then started driving to the hospital.
They came across an ambulance and managed to stop it. Paramedics in the ambulance then attended to Busuttil, the inspector says. But he died some time later. All that is captured on CCTV.
What the LESA warden saw
10.29am The warden told police that he was called to the site due to a collision.
When he got there, he instructed Busuttil and Hamdan to move their vehicles, but neither of them wanted to do so. Hamdan eventually moved his motorcycle.
The warden then proceeded to speak to each party separately, to get their version of events.
He first spoke to Hamdan. Jean Paul Busuttil approached them, and the warden asked him to move away. Busuttil persisted.
At that point, Hamdan’s son, who had reached the scene, intervened. Things got very heated and Hamdan told Busuttil “Just wait, you’ll soon see who I am. You’ll see what I’m capable of” [Stennieni, dalwaqt tkun taf min jien. Taħseb li ma nasalx jien?]
Hamdan then left the scene. When he returned, around three to four minutes later, he told the warden to “get out of the way” and then fired his gun.
Busuttil clutched his neck, the warden told the inspector. The warden then ran away, afraid he would be next. He saw Hamdan move off the road into a nearby area with reeds and then returned.
'Yes, I shot'
10.22am The inspector continues testifying.
At around 7.30am, police received a call requesting their intervention in the area. Five minutes later, a second call reported gunshots fired.
When police reached the scene, they found an “agitated” LESA warden on the side of the road. He directed police to the incident scene. There, they found the accused and his son.
There were two motorcycles – Hamdan’s and one belonging to his son – and a LESA vehicle with what looked like marks of a bullet ricochet on its windscreen. There was a live round on the ground and what looked like a “spray of blood” on the ground.
Mohamed Hamdan told police “yes, I shot”. He was promptly arrested.
Wife and mother-in-law were in car
10.19am Jean Paul Busuttil’s wife and mother-in-law were also in the Volvo at the time of the incident, the inspector reveals.
A Sunday morning bumper-to-bumper
10.16am Inspector Kurt Colombo Zahra testifies that a sergeant stationed in Mosta had come across a bumper-to-bumper collision while driving to work through Bidnija.
The victim, Jean Paul Busuttil, was driving a Volvo car. Hamdan was on a Yamaha motorcycle.
The two collided on a one-way country lane, with Hamdan having apparently driven up it the wrong way. It was not a major collision, the inspector says.
Busuttil and Hamdan argued, and the sergeant calmed them down. He also contacted LESA to send a warden to the site, and then continued on his way to work.
Accused in court
10.12am Hamdan is escorted into the courtroom. He is wearing a beige jacket, brown tie, blue shirt and jeans.
The hearing can now begin.
Who are the lawyers?
10.06am Attorney General lawyers Mauro Abela and Kaylie Bonett are leading the prosecution.
Lawyers Edward Gatt, Mario and Nicholas Mifsud are assisting the accused.
Lawyers Arthur Azzopardi, Jacob Magri and David Farrugia Sacco will appear for the victim’s family.
What charges is Hamdan facing?
10.01am The most serious charge Hamdan faces is that of having murdered Busuttil.
But he also faces a raft of other charges: causing the victims’ relatives fear that violence would be used against them, wilful damage, and being in possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime.
He is also charged with being in possession of a weapon without the necessary licence, destroying traces of the crime and driving a motorcycle in the wrong direction.
And there's one more charge - recidivism - which is linked to Hamdan's history of violent crime.
Welcome
9.55am Good morning and welcome to this live blog. We're at the Valletta law courts, where the compilation of evidence in this murder case will kick off in a court presided by Magistrate Astrid May Grima.