Updated 12.19pm

A court of appeal has thrown out a request by Alfred and George Degiorgio to have a retrial after they were sentenced to 40 years in prison for their role as hitmen in the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. 

The two brothers were about to face trial by jury just over a year ago when they registered a last-minute admission. That unexpected twist resulted in a 40-year jail term for each of them. 

Barely two weeks later, they filed an application before the Court of Appeal in its superior jurisdiction, calling for a retrial. 

They claimed that they had filed the last-minute admission after their long-term lawyer, William Cuschieri, renounced his brief with weeks to go before the trial. 

Two legal aid lawyers appointed by the court to represent them were unable to comb through all the evidence in time and told the court it was physically impossible for them to do so. 

Faced with such a scenario and lacking equality of arms, the brothers said they chose to file a guilty plea and get the matter over and done with, rather than endure “the unjust prospect of a prolonged death" by going to trial. 

They also argued that Alfred Degiorgio was not in a position to freely consent to that admission at the time, as he was weak after a days-long hunger strike and needed to be escorted to court in a wheelchair. 

On Wednesday, the court, presided over by Chief Justice Mark Chetcuti and Justices Joseph R Micallef and Giovanni Grixti, rejected all their arguments and confirmed the Degiorgio brothers' 40-year jail term.

The court found that the legal workings leading to the brothers’ admission began before their long-standing lawyer quit the case, and the two had been assessed by a doctor and psychiatrist after pleading guilty, to ensure the admission was given freely.

It also noted that the legal aid lawyers appointed to represent the Degiorgio brothers had more than 40 days to prepare the case, more than double the minimum period required by law.

Moreover, all witnesses who had testified in the compilation of evidence before the Magistrates’ Court would have testified again at the trial and faced cross-examination by the defence.

Malta's jury system left no room for surprises and the accused would not have been faced with new evidence, the court said.

It added that the Criminal Court judge had adopted “great caution” to ensure their admission did not come about involuntarily but was taken freely. 

When all was considered, the court found nothing lacking in terms of balance, proportionality and overall fairness of the criminal proceedings. 

The court also dismissed Alfred Degiorgio’s plea that he was too weak to properly admit to the crime, noting that medical assessments found no issues with his mental faculties and that his own lawyers had not objected at the time.

The judge presiding over the trial could not but rely on those assessments pronounced by the court-appointed medical experts. 

Alfred Degiorgio’s allegedly poor mental state had not been flagged by his defence before the reading out of the bill of indictment, nor had there been any request for him to be examined by a psychiatrist. 

It was only the care and diligence adopted by the Criminal Court judge that led to that psychiatric assessment after the accused changed plea, registering an admission.