A former notary has failed in his bid to escape time behind bars after landing a four-year jail term for multiple misappropriation charges, merely days after being cleared of similar wrongdoing by a different court. 

Pierre Falzon, a 59-year-old former notary who has since voluntarily renounced his warrant, was facing parallel appeal proceedings following two convictions by the Magistrates’ Courts over misappropriation of funds meant for the state coffers in respect of deeds published by the notary. 

In the earlier judgment delivered by the Court of Criminal Appeal on June 18, that Court had reduced his punishment from a two-year jail term suspended for four years to a three-month jail term suspended for three years, after concluding that the prosecution had wrongly issued charges for misappropriation rather than embezzlement. 

That court had decided that the Criminal Code provisions on misappropriation were not applicable to public officers, including notaries, who were to be charged under the crime of embezzlement. 

Yet, five days later, the same Court, presided over by a different judge, concluded otherwise, observing that had the legislator intended to exclude public officers from the articles on misappropriation, the law would have expressly said so.

Madam Justice Consuelo Scerri Herrera, in a 107-page long judgment, said that when the prosecution pressed charges for alleged misappropriation, the Court’s role was to analyse the evidence so as to decide whether the elements of that crime subsisted, “irrespective of whether the accused was a public officer or not.”

That fact would then be taken into consideration for purposes of punishment, the Court went on. 

In this case, the crime had been sufficiently proved, said Madam Justice Scerri Herrera, referring to no less than 27 cases wherein the appellant had received money intended to pay for duty on documents and/or capital gains tax, depositing the funds into accounts held under his wife’s name, or under the name of companies in which he had an active role.

Such acts were “deplorable” and tarnished the notarial profession, went on the Court, stating that the appellant was to answer for his wrongdoing.

As a notary he had been trusted by society and people would hand over their money to him without ever dreaming of being cheated.

When meting out punishment the Court, however, took note of the fact that the appellant had refunded some of his former clients and registered a good number of the contracts before criminal action was taken. 

For this reason, the Court confirmed his conviction but reduced the jail term by one year, condemning him to a four-year term behind bars. 

The Court also confirmed an order issued by the Magistrates’ Court, for the Police Commissioner to investigate the appellant and his wife over possible breaches of money laundering laws.

Finally, in view of the other appeal judgment delivered last week, Madam Justice Scerri Herrera ordered notification of her judgment to the Justice Minister for any necessary amendments should the legislator intend to exclude public officers from the sections on misappropriation. 

Inspector Rennie Stivala prosecuted.