Ex-police commissioner 'categorically denies' murder plot claim
Convicted killer Vince Muscat told Yorgen Fenech trial he heard Cassar was 'one of the four people' involved
Ex-police commissioner Michael Cassar has "categorically denied" claims he was involved in an aborted plot to murder journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Cassar, who served as police commissioner between 2014 and 2016, dismissed the allegations when contacted by Times of Malta.
He stepped down as commissioner in April 2016 during the Panama Papers scandal, when the police were facing pressure for their apparent reluctance to investigate ex-government officials Keith Schembri and Konrad Mizzi over secretive offshore structures they opened while in government.
Cassar told a public inquiry into the journalist's murder that government authorities "wouldn't dare" interfere in police investigations.
The hearsay claims linking Cassar to the aborted plot surfaced during testimony by convicted hitman Vince Muscat during the trial against businessman Yorgen Fenech.
Muscat, who has admitted to his role in Caruana Galizia's murder, recalled on Monday how fellow convicted killer George Degiorgio told him that Cassar was "one of the four people" behind an earlier plot to kill the journalist.
According to Muscat, Degiorgio had told him then economy minister Chris Cardona wanted the journalist killed and that he, the Degiorgio brothers and bomb supplier Jamie Vella had been asked to carry out the shooting for €150,000.
Muscat said the 2015 murder plan collapsed because the requested deposit was never paid.
"It was all talk," Muscat said of the alleged plot.
Fenech is on trial for a seperate plot that led to Caruana Galizia being blown up by a car bomb in October 2017.
Prosecutors allege Fenech paid €150,000 through middleman Melvin Theuma to arrange the killing.
Theuma asked them to stop the plot when the 2017 election was called, but had them resume it once the election was over, Muscat testified on Monday.
Muscat said Theuma told them that the order to kill Caruana Galizia was due to her being on the cusp of publishing “something big” and that if she published it before she was killed, the person behind the order would call the whole thing off.