A court case instituted against entrepreneur Anġlu Xuereb for having allegedly spent more than the legal limit to have himself elected in the 1994 local elections was finally closed by a court on Thursday.

Mr Xuereb had been accused of spending more than the statutory limit of Lm500 (1,150 euro) in the election which saw him elected at mayor of Naxxar. He was also accused of failing to send a report of his spending to the Electoral Commission in time and making a false declaration.

Magistrate Charmaine Galea observed that Mr Xuereb had first appeared in court on January 24, 1995.

The case - presided by different magistrates - was subsequently put off several times because of a pending constitutional case. On October 26, 2000 it was put off so that the prosecution could present its evidence, but that did not happen.

On February 1, 2002, the court put off the case indefinitely after it was declared that the prosecution did not seem to have an interest.

The case was recalled on May 2002 and some evidence was heard but on October 10, 2005  the court again put the case off indefinitely.

When the case was re-appointed the accused appeared before the court on June 27, 2018 - meaning a span of 13 years since the last hearing.

After considering that the penalties in case of conviction, the court also observed that in terms of the law as amended in 2002, prescription in criminal cases was interrupted from the date of the charges or the notification of the cases until sentencing.

Prof Anthony Mamo had argued in his Notes on Criminal Procedure that in order for acts of the proceedings to interrupt prescription, it was necessary that they be served on the person charged or accused.

In this case, it had been shown that for 13 years, Mr Xuereb was not notified of any act which could break the prescriptive period.

The court therefore declared the case time-barred.

Lawyers Michael Schriha and Patrick Galea appeared for Mr Xuereb.