Updated 9.30am with brother's tribute
A Maltese fugitive couple that was on Europol’s most wanted list has been found in Libya, with one of the two dead.
Jomic Calleja Maatouk was caught and arrested by Libyan troops on Thursday evening. Arresting officers told Maltese authorities that his wife, Marzia, 24, was found dead.
The couple vanished last August, days after Calleja Maatouk was sentenced to five years in prison for importing explosives and attempting to buy a lethal poison on the dark web.
Their disappearance triggered a Europe-wide manhunt and led to Europol listing the couple on its list of most wanted fugitives. At the time, intelligence sources said they believed the couple fled Malta by sea and was hiding in Serbia.
Work to track them down continued in the ensuing months, with the couple believed to have spent time in Italy before making their way to North Africa.
Jomic Calleja Maatouk's Europol public file.Caught in Libya
On Wednesday morning, the Calleja Maatouk couple was located roughly 90 minutes east of Tripoli, and Libyan authorities were immediately informed through diplomatic channels.
Sources said Maltese-trained Libyan troops were dispatched to the area within hours. There, they are understood to have found a dead body that matched the description of Marzia Calleja Maatouk.
Jomic, 38, was found alive following a search of the surrounding area.
An autopsy will be carried out on the dead body in the coming days, to confirm the identity and cause of death.
Marzia's brother Marvin Zammit posted a tribute to her on Friday morning, seemingly confirming the death.
"I won't see you again, I can't believe it," he wrote on Facebook.
Marzia Calleja Maatouk was also on the Europol list.A 'lethal weapon'
Jomic Calleja Maatouk, who is now in Libyan custody, is expected to be extradited to Malta, where he is wanted for having skipped bail.
He was described as a “lethal weapon” by a magistrate last year after the court heard how he first tried to purchase doses of radioactive material Polonium-210, killer poison Ricin and the highly potent synthetic opioid fentanyl online.
He told dark web vendors that he was targeting a person between 165cm and 175cm tall, and that he needed five doses initially but would later need more.
When he was unable to source those toxins, he ordered an explosive, C-4, instead. Maltese police were tipped off about that shipment and caught Calleja Maatouk through a controlled delivery operation.
It was a familiar criminal pattern for the Żebbuġ-based Calleja Maatouk: a few years earlier, he had been charged with importing gunpowder without a permit.
Fears for Marzia's safety
His wife, Marzia, was not involved in his dark web case. But she had her own legal troubles after she was caught with 340 grams of cannabis in a car in 2019. Jomic, at the time her boyfriend, was also in that car.
In the same month that Jomic Calleja Maatouk was sentenced to five years in prison for importing explosives, Marzia received a 15-month jail term for cannabis possession with intent to traffic.
Within weeks, they both vanished.
Marzia Calleja Maatouk’s family told Times of Malta they found the house the couple shared in disarray, and said they feared for Marzia's safety.
Strong diplomatic relations
The Libyan operation will further strengthen diplomatic relations between Malta and Libya’s Government of National Accord.
Malta has placed significant emphasis on improving its ties to Tripoli in recent years and regularly raises Libya-related issues in its interventions at EU level.
Malta has discussed ambitious energy plans with Libya, agreed on a secretive migration-related pact with the country and dispatched soldiers and rescue workers there last year following disastrous flooding.