The family of murder victim Paulina Dembska are facing fresh anguish after her body went missing en route to Poland for her funeral planned for Saturday.

Sources close to the family told Times of Malta that the body left Malta for Heathrow on an Air Malta flight this week but was not put on the next flight to Warsaw.

When her family enquired as to the whereabouts of the Polish woman's remains, they were told they were "somewhere in Heathrow".

An Air Malta spokesperson said the remains were placed on a later flight and eventually arrived in Poland on Friday.

However the body needs to be transported to another part of Poland for her funeral on Saturday and the family fear the remains will not arrive in time.

Asked to explain the repatriation delay, Air Malta said that the remains were transported on its KM 100 to London Heathrow on the morning of Wednesday 2nd February. 

"The remains were scheduled to be transferred to Warsaw on Thursday 3rd February by a third-party handler with a non-Air Malta flight," it said.

"It appears that this was not done in time and the remains were uplifted on a later flight from Heathrow and arrived in Warsaw on the morning of Friday 4th February."

Paulina Dembska was raped and murdered in Sliema on January 2 and a man, Abner Aquilina, has been accused of the crime.

During the first court sitting, the police told the court that Abner told investigators he didn't intend on hurting Dembska "that much".

Aquilina had allegedly followed and attempted to attack two men before the 29-year-old woman was murdered.

He said his life echoed Stanley Kubrick's dystopian horror movie A Clockwork Orange, whose psychopathic protagonist is imprisoned for rape and murder.

Aquilina did not appear in court on Friday for the second sitting of his compilation of evidence.