The police have insisted they investigate all allegations of a criminal nature, in light of testimony linking former government minister Chris Cardona to an alleged plot to kill Daphne Caruana Galizia in 2014.
The alleged plot was aborted and Caruana Galizia was killed three years later in car bomb attack in 2017.
Self-confessed killer Vince Muscat, known as Il-Koħħu, claimed in court last week that he drove fellow killer George Degiorgio to meet Cardona and discuss killing the journalist back in 2014.
Muscat is serving a 15-year sentence for his role in the 2017 assassination of the investigative journalist while Degiorgio was sentenced to 40 years in jail for his part in the killing.
Muscat said he did not see Cardona during this 2014 meeting at Portomaso, having just dropped off Degiorgio at a nearby roundabout.
“He [Degiorgio] did not tell me anything else. But those €150,000 came from there. In truth, I never saw Cardona, but George told me that those €150,000 were coming from Cardona,” Muscat said.
The 2014 murder plot was eventually abandoned, with another plot hatched in 2017, allegedly at the behest of renowned businessman Yorgen Fenech.
Following his arrest for the journalist’s murder, Fenech had initially tried to pin the October 2017 car bombing on Cardona, before changing his version of events by blaming the murder on ex-OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri.
A spokesperson for the force told Times of Malta that the police investigate all allegations of a criminal nature that come to its attention.
Cardona was briefly questioned by police after he was first mentioned by Fenech in November 2019. Fenech later claimed that the plan to pin the murder plot on Cardona was hatched by Schembri.
Schembri, too, was arrested and released that same month.
Fenech’s arrest led to the collapse of ex-prime minister Joseph Muscat’s administration.
Both Muscat and Schembri stepped down as a result of the Tumas magnate’s arrest, while Cardona “suspended” himself from his cabinet post.
Muscat’s successor, Robert Abela, declined to reappoint Cardona to cabinet, and also forced his hand to resign as Labour’s deputy leader.
Testifying in the public inquiry into Caruana Galizia’s assassination, Cardona dismissed claims he had advanced knowledge of the murder, saying attempts to link him to the plot were a “frame-up”.
In the months prior to the assassination, Cardona had pushed back at blog posts by Caruana Galizia stating he had visited a brothel while in Germany on government work.
Cardona reacted to the series of blog posts by suing the journalist and putting a freeze on her assets.
He has also denied knowing the Degiorgio brothers in a social context, instead insisting he came into contact with them through his legal work.