A magistrate has turned down a request to investigate a woman’s claims that her husband was plotting to have her murdered.

Magistrate Ian Farrugia has denied the woman’s request for a magisterial inquiry to investigate her claims that her husband was planning to have her assassinated as the two underwent separation proceedings. 

Earlier this month, Times of Malta reported how the woman claimed to have discovered that her husband was hatching the plan to kill her with the help of third parties.

Court documents, filed by legal procurator Peter Paul Zammit on the woman’s behalf, detail how the “frightened and worried” woman discovered that her husband had approached an Azerbaijan man, understood to be one of his employees, to help contract a hitman.

Police did not feel there were grounds to prosecute

To support her claims, the woman supplied the magistrate with two video recordings of the foreign man allegedly recounting conversations he had with the woman’s estranged husband.

In the recordings, the man claims to have been offered money to engage an assassin from his home country.

Devices, including a small hidden camera, were also submitted by the woman.

It is understood, however, that Magistrate Farrugia, on reviewing the details of the case, sent the woman back to the police and refused to investigate the matter himself.

Zammit has since filed an appeal. 

Meanwhile, police sources have told Times of Malta that they investigated the matter when the woman first reported it to them last year.

After reviewing the case, the police did not feel there were grounds to prosecute, the sources said. 

The alleged crimes that the woman is claiming her estranged husband committed carry a prison sentence in excess of 20 years.

Criminal defence lawyers Franco Debono and Marion Camilleri are counsel to the husband.