Eight teenagers face multiple rape charges

Thirteen boys and a girl, aged between 15 and 20, were yesterday charged with defiling 16 minors and eight of the boys, all teenagers, were also charged with raping five of the minors on several, separate occasions.

In the beginning of a court case termed by Police Inspector Anthony Cassar as "an unusual case in Malta", the defendants, whose names cannot be published by court order, pleaded not guilty to all the charges brought against them.

They were all charged with defiling the 16 girls, all minors, violent indecent assault and holding them against their will.

They were also charged with offending public morals, exposing themselves in public and extortion.

The girl, who is 16 years old, was charged with threatening two of the minors over the phone, showing them pornographic films, the possession of the pornographic material and circulating it.

Eight of the boys were charged with raping five of the victims, one of whom had a disability.

The charges list 15 episodes of rape, on seven separate occasions, on the same five girls. Some alleged crimes involved two or three of the defendants.

The 16-year-old girl and two boys (one of whom was charged with rape) were also charged with violent indecent assault.

Two of the boys were charged with trying to seriously injure two girls by putting a lit cigarette in the eye of one of them and by hurling a glass in the direction of the other.

Seven of the boys were charged with theft, ranging from cars to mobile phones and restaurant furniture.

Four boys were charged with forging and making use of counterfeit Lm10 bills while three boys were charged with driving without a licence or insurance cover.

After pleading not guilty to the 45 charges brought against the accused, their defence lawyers asked Inspector Cassar, prosecuting, to justify their state of arrest.

The officer explained that the defendants had willingly gone to the police station at 11 yesterday morning when he summoned them and he felt they were to be arraigned under arrest due to the serious nature of the charges.

But the lawyers argued that in light of their willingness to appear at the police station when asked to, not to mention other things, there was no need for arrest.

The inspector then elaborated that during the three weeks in which he had been investigating the case he had received several reports of threats from the families of victims.

The magistrate ordered the inspector to fetch the reports. When the case resumed the inspector exhibited three reports, claiming there were more that had not been found as yet.

After lengthy submissions by both parties, Magistrate Miriam Hayman ruled that the arraignment, under arrest, of the 14 defendants was not justified. This automatically meant that bail conditions, which by nature are a release from arrest, were no longer applicable.

However, the inspector asked the magistrate to impose conditions on the defendants to endure they would turn up for future court sittings and not tamper with evidence.

Magistrate Hayman ordered the defendants to appear for court sittings when summoned, forbade them from approaching and communicating with the victims and their families and bound them against a personal guarantee of Lm1,000 each.

At the end of the four-hour arraignment, the 14 defendants, most of whom wearing in jeans, walked out of the court room where their families waited for them.

The case continues.

Dr Giannella Caruana Curran, Dr Emmanuel Mallia, Dr Jospeh Giglio, Dr Roberto Montalto, Dr Malcolm Mifsud, Dr Cedric Mifsud, Dr Stephen Thake and Dr Noel Camilleri appeared for the defendants.