Malta woke up to a most tragic event when the young life of a mother of two children ended violently, the victim of a merciless shooting allegedly carried out by her estranged husband.

Apart from the horror of the violence perpetrated on the poor mother, we feel sadness and repulsion at the cruel destiny forced on two children who will grow up, maternal orphans, with the difficulty of contending with such a murder.

The pattern of events leading to femicide has now become quite known, it all starts off with domestic violence and a male refusal to accept a breakdown of a marriage or partnership. If left untreated, such a situation will quickly degenerate and too frequently lead to a killing of the wife, the mother or the partner. If femicide has become so obviously predictable, how come our society is so pathetically unable to forestall and prevent such a cruel crime?

Post this murder, the timeliness and effectiveness of the measures taken by our police and our law courts have been shown to be horribly inadequate. To no avail Bernice Cassar grasped at all the remedies that appeared on offer to guarantee her safety. The last contact she made with the police barely preceded her murder by a week. A summons to call at police headquarters for an interrogation was simply ignored by the husband and, two days later, the murder occurred.                   

It is so irritating to hear once more that an independent inquiry has been launched to establish whether any state institution failed to prevent the killing. Honourable Minister, state institutions miserably failed the victim. Our police force and our law courts performed in a predictably inadequate manner. The alleged aggressor repeatedly used violence against the victim and on so many occasions failed to observe police summons.

In what should have been the safe comfort of her home, Bernice reported a serious incident when a knife was threateningly placed against her throat. She took the judicious decision to move out of the home and put her trust in our law courts.  For her peace of mind, she got to know that the alleged perpetrator of this horrible aggression would, in 15 months’ time, be called to answer for his actions.

So, is our police force and are our law courts to blame for the tragedy that occurred? Could it have been avoided? On both counts yes but the accusation cannot stop there. Our police force and our law courts operate according to established law, rules and regulations, which may or may not be adequate. More importantly, these institutions are also subject to availability of resources to operate effectively. We know that these resources are lacking.

Is it too much to expect our legal community to deliver an efficient justice system?- Arthur Muscat

Now this is where the responsibility for leaving Bernice so exposed to obvious danger has to spread out and so many other factors come into play.

Femicide prevention, apart from adequate legislation, requires to be tackled through an early identification of dangerous situations. Marriage breakdowns and manifestly deranged behaviour by men should be nipped in the bud.

Such situations should initially be tackled with legally mandatory psychological treatment. Just a ‘threatening’ police intervention will probably increase the possibility of a prospective murderer becoming angrier and going berserk.

For an effective, quicker and qualified response to cries for help, more resources have to go towards our police. However, we also need to rope in psychology and psychiatry practitioners in this effort.

The contribution of the law courts towards femicide prevention must go beyond just legislation. When is someone, with serious intent, going to declare that a magistrate loaded with thousands of cases is not on? For how long are we going to accept a criminal court that issues a sentence 18 years after the start of proceedings?

In relation to the population, Malta must have the highest number of lawyers per capita. Is it too much to expect our legal community to deliver an efficient justice system? Are our lawyers happy to operate within a legal infrastructure which appears unfit for purpose? Lawyers have clout, why do they not use it and get our politicians, so many of whom are lawyers, to direct resources where needed.

In conclusion, many of us citizens as well should bear a responsibility for leaving Bernice so exposed to obvious danger. We too should put pressure on our politicians. For too long we have tolerated a serious lack of effective legal structures and procedures.

We must tell our politicians that we can do with less wasteful positions of trust, less expensive useless consultancies. We need such resources better directed towards our law courts and police force. Bernice is sadly not with us anymore; should we get moving to prevent a tragic repetition?

Arthur Muscat is a human resources and industrial relations specialist.