Wrap: Yorgen Fenech's lawyers cite Schembri, Cardona in Arnaud cross-examination
Defence grills lead investigator in Daphne Caruana Galizia murder case in seven-hour sitting
Updated 6.30pm
Yorgen Fenech’s defence team spent hours on Tuesday questioning the credibility of a police investigation into the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, as the case’s lead investigator came under cross-examination.
Throughout a seven-hour hearing, defence lawyers revisited allegations involving former minister Chris Cardona, former police commissioner Lawrence Cutajar, lawyer David Gatt and other figures previously mentioned in evidence.
They also sought to dent the credibility of the case's star witness, murder middleman Melvin Theuma, highlighting his property portfolio and implying he bribed the police commissioner to get a presidential pardon.
Assistant police commissioner Keith Arnaud rejected those suggestions and defended key decisions taken throughout the investigation.
Much of the cross-examination centred on alternative theories of the murder that have surfaced over the years, with Arnaud repeatedly maintaining that police had pursued those leads before ruling them out.
Arnaud defended the timing of Theuma's arrest, saying police had delayed moving in until they had secured crucial evidence and telling jurors Europol had described the strategy as "very solid".
Police had investigated leads that linked Cardona and his associates to Caruana Galizia’s murder, he said, but none of the claims held up to investigative scrutiny.
Fenech, the heir to the Tumas Group business empire, is pleading not guilty to complicity in Caruana Galizia's murder. Three men have been convicted of carrying out the assassination, while two others are serving life sentences for supplying the bomb.
Theuma, who turned state’s witness shortly after his 2019 arrest, says he served as a middleman between Fenech and the hitmen, handing them €150,000 of Fenech’s money to carry out the assassination.
Tuesday marked the defence's first sustained opportunity to challenge the prosecution's version of events, after five days dominated by evidence from attorney general lawyers and Arnaud's account of the investigation – including Fenech’s arrest as he sailed out of the Portomaso marina, which his family owns, in the dead of night.
Keith Schembri, Fenech’s childhood friend and at the time the right-hand man of then-Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, again loomed large over proceedings despite not being on trial.
Jurors heard that police searched Schembri’s home and office and learnt that his phone was not the only thing that had gone missing – Schembri’s laptop was never found, either.
The defence also questioned Arnaud about a phantom government job given to Theuma at Schembri’s behest, and the middleman's fears that Schembri might have him killed or jailed.
“Melvin was afraid of Keith Schembri,” defence lawyer Giannella De Marco told the witness.
“Yes,” Arnaud confirmed. “He was afraid Schembri would kill him or have him thrown into prison.”
The case resumes on Wednesday morning.
The prosecution was led by Attorney General lawyers Anthony Vella, Godwin Cini and Danika Vella.
Fenech was represented by lawyers Giannella de Marco, Charles Mercieca and Gianluca Caruana Curran.
The Caruana Galizia family was represented by lawyers Jason Azzopardi and Therese Comodini Cachia.
Judge Edwina Grima presided over proceedings.
Trial day 2: Prosecutors make their case
Trial day 3: How police homed in on the hitmen
Trial day 4: A murder middleman names Yorgen Fenech
Trial day 5: Fenech, Keith Schembri and Joseph Muscat
As it happened
Case adjourned
6.20pm The judge calls time on today's court session. Jurors are told to withdraw and the case is adjourned until tomorrow morning.
We'll have a wrap-up of today's key points of testimony available at the top of this article soon.
Melvin Theuma's fear of Schembri
6.10pm After a testy exchange (‘I knew you’d ask me this question,’ Arnaud says. ‘You must be telepathic,’ De Marco shoots back), questioning focuses on Melvin Theuma’s fear of Keith Schembri.
De Marco: Melvin was afraid of someone.
Arnaud: He was certainly afraid of Yorgen, who is what he is, whose friend is who he is.
De Marco: He was afraid of Keith Schembri.
Arnaud: Yes, he was afraid of Keith Schembri.
De Marco: He was afraid Keith Schembri would kill him.
Arnaud: He was afraid he would kill him, or chuck him in prison. That’s what he told me.
De Marco: He kept texting Yorgen Fenech until the very end.
Arnaud: Yes, agreed.
De Marco: Melvin hadn’t mentioned the letter you found on Fenech, right?
Arnaud: Correct, he had forgotten about it. But he left that photo of himself with Keith Schembri in his box.
De Marco: To show who was protecting him?
The judge intervenes - that's a leading question, she tells the defence lawyer.
Keith Schembri and Melvin Theuma at Schembri's Castille office.Interrogating the doctor
5.40pm Arnaud confirms that Adrian Vella had collected the letter from Keith Schembri, to give to Yorgen Fenech. He says he cannot be 100% sure what was in it.
Vella was interrogated in connection with the letter and was aware the investigation concerned the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, Arnaud confirms in reply to a defence question.
Doctor's letter
5.30pm Questioning resumes.
De Marco asks if police found Keith Schembri’s safe. Arnaud says he doesn’t recall a safe.
De Marco: And what did you seize from Castille?
Arnaud: Definitely some documents, but I don’t think there were any electronic devices there.
De Marco changes tack. Did the police check the doctor's letter for fingerprints?
Arnaud: Yes.
De Marco: There were around 70 prints on it.
Arnaud: None were Keith Schembri’s.
[The letter in question was a notorious letter given to Yorgen Fenech by doctor Adrian Vella, days after Fenech's initial arrest. It allegedly presented Fenech with a scenario he could use to pin the murder on Chris Cardona and Melvin Theuma. Vella was the Fenech family doctor and also knew Schembri. He previously testified that Schembri had given him the letter – six sheets of paper he claimed he did not read – to hand over to Fenech as he examined him].
30 minutes for photos
5.20pm The past 30 minutes has been taken up with a series of photos taken during the search of Keith Schembri’s home.
There was some legal back-and-forth over what jurors were allowed to see, but ultimately they circulated some printed-out images of devices seized.
Legal disagreements
4.50pm The defence says Keith Schembri's phone [the phone that went missing] last showed activity at 5am on the day of the police search.
Attorney General lawyers Anthony Vella and Godwin Cini, who are leading the prosecution against Yorgen Fenech, intervene to object. Jurors are being sidetracked, they say. The defence is cherry-picking facts to suit its arguments.
Defence lawyers say they're simply establishing facts that were stated in other investigations related to the case: Schembri's phone was last switched on at 5.04am and then could not be found.
Keith Schembri's laptop also went missing
4.30pm Keith Schembri managed to lose both his phone and laptop, Arnaud reveals under oath.
Arnaud is answering questions about a search of Schembri's home, which Inspector Kurt Zahra was also present for.
"We seized all electronic devices, including his wife’s tablet," he says.
He then says that Schembri's phone and laptop were never found.
Police also searched Schembri’s office at Castille, which had been sealed, Arnaud says. “I don’t remember what we seized, but the whole thing was filmed,” he says of that search.
Jurors are shown photos taken by police officers during those searches.
Theuma's phantom job
4.10pm De Marco: Do you agree that Melvin Theuma cited Keith Schembri a lot in his recordings and in intercepts?
Arnaud: He mentioned him a lot in his recordings, but not in intercepts.
De Marco: Keith Schembri gave Melvin a phantom job.
Arnaud: He referred him to a ministry and told him to speak to a certain person about a job.
De Marco: Did he [Melvin] get cheques in connection with this job?
Arnaud: Yes, I confirm that. He received the last one a month before the murder.
On Kenneth Camilleri, OPM bodyguard
3.56pm The defence asks about Kenneth Camilleri, a former OPM security official.
Arnaud confirms that he had questioned Camilleri but says his mobile phone was not seized.
Camilleri had been dispatched by Keith Schembri to go to Johann Cremona and to then speak to Melvin Theuma, De Marco notes. Theuma later said Camilleri told him the Degiorgio brothers would be getting a million each, she adds.
“Correct, agreed,” Arnaud confirms.
Arnaud also confirms that Camilleri was told his job was to “calm” a panicked Theuma, and that he did not know why Theuma needed calming.
Camilleri did not know Yorgen Fenech and police never understood why he had first been sent to Cremona’s, rather than straight to Melvin Theuma.
Police searched Schembri's home
3.47pm Arnaud confirms, in reply to a defence question, that he and other police officers once searched Keith Schembri’s home.
De Marco suggests that search happened on November 7, 2017 [just weeks after Caruana Galizia was killed.
Arnaud says “definitely not" on that date.
“At that point we were combing through her [Daphne’s] writings, while we waited for results from the evidence we had gathered. We were looking at who she had been writing about.”
No probe into Keith Schembri
3.33pm De Marco: You told us you didn’t know Keith Schembri was a suspect.
Arnaud: He was never a suspect until November 2019 [when Theuma was arrested]. There was no Schembri-linked probe in the inquiry. We just preserved his phone data.
[Not Schembri’s original phone – that went missing hours before his initial arrest].
Arnaud says he took over the murder investigation in 2018 after a court ordered the previous lead investigator, Silvio Valletta, off the case.
[Valletta, a top police officer at the time, was friends with Fenech and had even gone abroad on football holidays with him. Theuma later testified that Valletta was leaking information to Fenech - something Valletta has denied].
Jurors shown Times stories
3.26pm Bang on cue – jurors are shown screenshots of Times of Malta stories that revealed the meetings between Il-Ġojja and the then-police Commissioner.
Commissioner's meeting with Ġojja
3.20pm Defence lawyer Giannella De Marco resumes her questioning. Arnaud confirms that Edwin Brincat il-Ġojja was seen meeting police commissioner Lawrence Cutajar before Theuma got his pardon.
Il-Ġojja was being tailed by the Malta Security Services at the time.
Arnaud confirms that the two definitely met, in secret, "within weeks of Theuma's arrest".
Cutajar claimed that he was trying to get information about Theuma's recordings, Arnaud says.
[Times of Malta had exclusively revealed those meetings - and the concerns they led to - back in 2020. Read our report here.]
Case resumes
3.10pm The judge and jury return to the courtroom. The court is back in session.
Case adjourned to 3pm
1.10pm Arnaud is asked if Lawrence Cutajar was still police commissioner when Theuma was granted a pardon.
“Yes, he was,” Arnaud says. “But he was no longer in the police corps when the recordings emerged.”
The judge adjourns the case until 3pm.
Cremona and Theuma's conversation
1pm The defence reads out a transcript of the call between Theuma and Cremona [its request for the call recording to be played in court is rejected by the court, as the recording was not exhibited as evidence in the case].
In it, Cremona and Theuma refer to a “16k” in relation to the police commissioner.
De Marco says that was money to be paid for Theuma’s presidential pardon.
Arnaud says they investigated that and found no evidence of that.
“There was another tape with this conversation, in which Theuma can be heard denying paying any money. And we also learnt that Cremona would tell Melvin stories, anything to keep him calm,” Arnaud says.
Theuma's suicide attempt
12.45pm Theuma had tried to kill himself while in witness protection, Arnaud confirms.
De Marco links that incident to a court hearing in which Theuma was asked if he had paid cash to get a presidential pardon. There was a recording implying Theuma had paid the police commissioner for his pardon, the defence lawyer suggests.
Arnaud says he doesn’t know about that. Nor does he know if Theuma and Cremona were in “continuous” contact.
Melvin Theuma.Theuma's recordings of Cremona
12.40pm Arnaud confirms that Theuma started recording Yorgen Fenech after Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered.
De Marco says Theuma had also recorded Johann Cremona [one of Fenech’s business partners who also knew Theuma] but had thrown away the mobile phone with those recordings.
Arnaud recalls Theuma telling him “did you find everything? Because I was under the impression there were more [recordings] than the ones you played back to me.”
Arnaud says Theuma confirms that he had thrown away a phone, but told police that all the recordings he had were in the box [that contained the recordings].
Court back in session
12.30pm The judge is back in the courtroom. The hearing resumes with defence and attorney general lawyers arguing over the way in which assets allegedly returned to the family of Theuma's partner have been described to jurors.
The judge makes it clear - jurors will be instructed to disregard testimony about that. These are separate proceedings, she rules.
Theuma's cash and properties
11.45am De Marco asks how much money Theuma was found with. Arnaud says he had around €400,000 to €450,000 in cash and property at the time of his arrest.
He also confirms that the mother of Theuma’s partner had shown up with €131,000 when Theuma was in police custody. She was arrested, he says. De Marco suggests the family got that money back.
“You’d have to ask the investigating officer,” Arnaud says. “I had nothing to do with that arrest or case. All I know is that she [ Theuma’s partner] and her mother were charged in connection with that money.”
De Marco said they reached a plea deal with prosecutors that allowed them to keep the money.
Arnaud says, in reply to questions, that Theuma held a “considerable” amount of property and assets, including a Jaguar and various other cars.
De Marco suggests Theuma had a €4m property portfolio. The judge stops that line of questioning.
Attorney General lawyers step in: there was no plea bargain to return money to Theuma's partner or her family, they say,
The judge calls a 30-minute recess.
Theuma's pardon
11.30am Theuma’s pardon covered multiple offences including money laundering, Arnaud confirms.
De Marco says it wiped Theuma’s slate clean for any crime committed before 2019, “whatever he did, whoever he killed, you gave him a clean sheet.”
Theuma and the police commissioner
11.20am Arnaud confirms that murder middleman Melvin Theuma had the police commissioner’s phone number.
“But he insists he never called him,” Arnaud says. “He was in charge of horse racing in Marsa at the time and claims he got the number from Edgar Brincat il-Ġojja, who told him to call the commissioner if fighting broke out at the horse racing track.”
[Il-Ġojja was close to the police commissioner at the time, Lawrence Cutajar, and it later emerged the two had met in secret during the murder probe.]
Arnaud also confirms police had information that Theuma was involved in an illegal gambling racket. But they did not focus too much on that, he says, as at the time talk had already shifted to him potentially getting a presidential pardon in relation to the murder.
Edgar Brincat, known as il-Ġojja, with Melvin Theuma.Police's timing of Theuma's arrest
11.10am After confirming that George Degiorgio claimed David Gatt had given him a weapon (“I remember him saying that but I don’t recall what weapon,” Arnaud testifies), the witness pushes back at the defence’s suggestion that the police commissioner did not want Melvin Theuma arrested.
“That is incorrect,” Arnaud says. “The commissioner pushed for us to move ahead with arrests, but I told him we still hadn’t found [Theuma’s] recordings. He understood why we had to hold off and agreed with me. There was no plan on a fixed date for the arrests – we had a lot of information but no plan on when to carry out the operation.”
De Marco asks: But Europol disagreed with you, isn’t that right?
Arnaud: “No, that’s not true. Europol never got involved, they have no jurisdiction over that. When we explained our plan to them, they said it was a ‘very solid’ one.”
Three bombs
10.59am De Marco’s questions turn to the bomb (or bombs, rather).
Arnaud confirms that three bombs had been acquired. One was used in the 2017 Msida Circus car bombing of Romeo Bone. Another in the explosion that killed Daphne Caruana Galizia. The third was used in a May 2018 explosion targeting Kevin Ellul, known as ‘Double O’.
Arnaud confirms that the SIM cards placed in the bomb and in the phone that triggered the bomb were bought on the same day in November 2016.
Police patrols in Bidnija
10.45am De Marco suggests that David Gatt spoke to Chris Cardona and asked him to get the police commissioner to stop sending patrol cars to the area where the hitmen were surveilling Daphne from.
Arnaud says that is “totally absurd.”
“Let’s not mislead jurors,” he tells the defence lawyer.
But Degiorgio had testified that no police car passed through the area for around six weeks, the defence lawyer presses.
Arnaud says Degiorgio’s testimony was misleading. His phone data showed that he was only in the area once in that period, Arnaud says, so how could he know if the police had patrolled there in that time?
Claims about a Freeport pass
10.30am De Marco asks Arnaud: Do you confirm that Vince Muscat said he never saw Melvin Theuma hand over money to Alfred Degiorgio?
Arnaud confirms that.
De Marco: Can you confirm that George Degiorgio said that Chris Cardona and David Gatt were part of the murder plot – both in 2015 and when she was eventually killed?
She says Degiorgio testified that before Magistrate Victor Axiak.
Arnaud says that from what he recalls, Degiorgio gave very little information about that.
De Marco says Degiorgio also testified about a container of contraband cigarettes and Toni l-Biglee, who was close to Cardona and who at the time was the Freeport’s head of security.
Arnaud confirms that, then adds: “We investigated this. The claim was that Alfred Degiorgio was to get a Freeport access pass, so he’d be able to get a container a year. But we never found evidence of that happening or anyone deriving that sort of benefit from inside the Freeport.”
He says he does not recall whether Toni l-Biglee was head of security at the time.
Assistant police commissioner Keith Arnaud exits court on Monday. Photo: Chris Sant FournierDrives to meet Cardona
10.05am De Marco asks Arnaud: Can you confirm that Vince Muscat il-Koħħu mentioned Chris Cardona, George Degiorgio, David Gatt and Jamie Vella as planning the murder? And that he drove Alfred Degiorgio to Cardona around five times?
Arnaud confirms that, but says il-Koħħu said the plot was cancelled and there is no evidence it was ever reactivated. Melvin Theuma, the self-confessed middleman, never featured in that alleged plot, he adds.
Arnaud says il-Koħħu drove Alfred Degiorgio to Cardona after the murder, as they wanted to try and get information into the ongoing murder investigation.
De Marco asks whether il-Koħħu also drove Degiorgio there before the murder.
Arnaud says he can’t remember everything but “I’m under the impression it was after the murder, not before.”
De Marco smiles.
“There’s nothing funny about it,” Arnaud snaps.
David Gatt
9.55am De Marco now asks about David Gatt, a former police officer-turned-lawyer who was close to Cardona and the murder hitmen.
Arnaud confirms that Gatt would hang out at the Marsa potato shed [where the hitmen were arrested]. He also confirms that Gatt had visited the Degiorgio brothers in prison after their arrests, telling wardens he was there to speak to them as their lawyer.
“He presented himself as their lawyer but never appeared for them in court,” Arnaud says. “At that stage they were struggling to find a lawyer and one of them had resorted to legal aid.”
De Marco notes that Vince Muscat il-Koħħu has testified that Gatt would mention Daphne and make gestures implying an explosion (opening his hands and saying ‘poof’) before and after she was killed.
She adds that il-Koħħu had also made reference to a man he called “number 1” who he later confirmed was Keith Schembri, the former OPM chief of staff.
Arnaud confirms that Koħħu had mentioned Schembri when he testified in a public inquiry into the murder in 2021.
He adds that George Degiorgio had also testified that Gatt had once told him that he was on the phone with Schembri.
David Gatt.Daphne's laptop
9.42am De Marco now asks about Daphne Caruana Galizia’s laptop. Police wanted to look into it, right?
Arnaud confirms that – police hoped the laptop would help them narrow down the possible murder motives by providing information about investigations Daphne was working on.
Her family gave investigators information about stories that could have led to her murder, he says.
De Marco presses Arnaud to say whether or not police got direct access to the laptop. Arnaud says Matthew Caruana Galizia provided the information, adding “I’ve never seen a victim whose mother was murdered try to mislead me.”
L-Iblaħ and Biglee
9.30am Defence lawyer Giannella de Marco begins by asking assistant police commissioner Keith Arnaud, the murder case's lead investigator, about a man known as Toni l-Iblaħ.
[Anthony Sammut, known as Toni l-Iblaħ, worked in Chris Cardona's ministry. He was cited in a letter given to Yorgen Fenech days after his initial arrest which sought to pin the murder on Cardona.]
Arnaud is shown a court decree citing Sammut as a person of interest in the murder probe. Was it ever mentioned that Sammut hung out at the Marsa potato shed and knew the hitmen, he is asked.
Arnaud says he first heard of Sammut in that infamous letter but he "never featured in my investigation". He learnt of his ties to the Degiorgio brothers and Vince Muscat il-Kohhu [the hitmen] in 2019.
The defence also asks Arnaud about Anthony Chetcuti, known as Il-Biglee. He is also close to Cardona and was cited in past testimony as having served as a go-between for the ex-minister.
Arnaud says evidence never led the police to the two men. Investigators were only asked to preserve their phone evidence, he adds.
Court in session
9.15am Judge Edwina Grima is in the courtroom. The jurors are here too. Day six in the trial of Yorgen Fenech can get under way.
Welcome
8.30am Good morning, and welcome to this live blog covering the sixth day in the trial of Yorgen Fenech.
The hearing is scheduled to begin at 9am and we expect it to run until around 6pm, with a break at around lunchtime.