A Transport Malta manager described on Thursday how an anonymous phone call he received on May 3 last year started a chain of events which led to the discovery of tampered odometers on hundreds of used cars imported from Japan.

David Caruana, senior manager at the Driving and Licensing Directorate was giving evidence in court proceedings against the owners of two car import firms. Roderick and Alison Vella, 46 and 47 respectively, from Żabbar and Alexander Spiteri, 48 from Mellieħa all pleaded not guilty to money laundering, fraud and criminal conspiracy related to alleged odometer tampering.

Caruana said no one had flagged any discrepancies in the mileage of second-hand cars imported from Japan before someone called him anonymously, telling him to “check the Jevic forms” and ending his call abruptly.  

That call came through from the reception desk at TM’s Paola offices but by the time he went out to check, the anonymous caller had disappeared.

Jevic forms are documents issued and sent with vehicles after inspection in Japan before being exported. They contain details which include mileage. 

Caruana said that on the same day when the call came through, TM blocked all registrations concerning second-hand imported vehicles from Japan and started an internal exercise whereby documentation submitted by the dealers and police, including the Jevic certificates were cross checked with the data on the Jevic website.

That exercise was done on a vehicle-by-vehicle basis and after running checks on 16, 773 Japan imports, 476 vehicles were found to have discrepancies in their mileage. 

 476 vehicles found to have discrepancies 

Caruana explained that before the end of last year, all vehicles imported from non-EU countries were inspected by police officials upon arrival at the harbour. But after the discovery of the alleged tampering, the process was changed so that port inspections are now done by TM officials.

Defence lawyer Franco Debono asked whether the police ever flagged any discrepancies.

“No,” replied Caruana, explaining under further questioning by the prosecution that the Jevic certificate that accompanied the imports from Japan was submitted to TM only once the vehicle was sold. And that could be years after its importation.

The nature and scope of the Jevic certification was explained by the next witness, Gilbert Agius, deputy chief officer at TM’s Land Transport Directorate.

He said the authority had introduced a requirement for that certificate in 2006 in respect of used cars imported from Japan. 

The document, bearing all vehicle details, was also meant to benefit consumers by ensuring that the mileage was authentic. Consumers could match the data on the certificate with the Jevic website in Japan.

At the time of its introduction, the Association of Used Cars Dealers had indicated Jevic as a reliable authority to produce such certification and TM had no cause to doubt that.

After checking vehicles imported between 2018 and 2022, it turned out that mileage had been tampered with between February 1, 2019 and May 2, 2022, just one day before the anonymous tip-off.

A report was forwarded by the chairman of Transport Malta to the police commissioner on May 5, 2022.

Following that verification, TM circulated a letter to affected customers pointing out the discrepancies in odometer readings and correcting the relative figures on the log books.

Talks were then held with Jevic representatives in Malta to fine-tune the system in such a manner that data inputted in TM’s Vehicle Registration and Administration System (VERA) was immediately checked against the original on the Jevic website.

Asked about Jevic, the witness confirmed that this was an inspection agency of international repute, certifying every movement of second-hand vehicles worldwide and providing information about every vehicle from registration till scrappage.

Until last year when the alleged tampering surfaced, no consumer had ever flagged any issue about mileage discrepancies, said the witness.

However, he could not explain what happened in the interim period when the Jevic certificate was sent from Japan until it landed at TM’s offices.

Nor was there any liaison with the police, said the witness when pressed further by Debono, adding that “each knew his work and what he was supposed to do. There’s the law and we follow the law.”

Asked by lawyer Jason Azzopardi whether TM had carried out due diligence in respect of Jevic, the answer was “no.”

That was when the lawyer pointed out that a “simple Google search during the sitting” revealed that Jevic had been found guilty of collusion with government officials in Kenya in a racket dating back to 2014.

“That’s TM’s due diligence! I ran a due diligence test in two minutes!” remarked Azzopardi.

Owner was offered a replacement car or a refund

Another witness was a female customer who had bought a Mazda CX 3 model from Spiteri.

She said that when the odometer fraud story emerged on the media, she had checked her car mileage on the given Jevic website link.

The 19,000 on her car turned out to be 119,000 [km].

The next day she faced the dealer who offered to give her a replacement car or reimburse the full amount.

When the new car had not arrived a month later, she opted for her money back.

She got €18,550 instead of the full €19,000 because the car bumper had meanwhile been damaged in a traffic collision, explained the witness.

But when asked by the defence, she confirmed that she had no further claims against Spiteri who had told her that it had been none of his fault. He claimed to have been swindled from Japan.

The case continues.

AG lawyers Etienne Savona and Marthese Ellul Grech prosecuted.

Lawyers Franco Debono and Jason Azzopardi were defence counsel.