A German request for a European Arrest Warrant for Maltese gaming consultant Iosif Galea was ignored by the head of a police bureau three times, an internal inquiry has found.
An inspector who heads the so-called Sirene bureau was identified as the official who ignored the request before Galea was arrested in Italy last May, embarrassingly while he was travelling in the same group as former prime minister Joseph Muscat.
The gaming consultant, who is now wanted in Malta over an alleged racket involving leaked information from the Maltese gaming regulator, was arrested by the Italian police because of a German investigation linked to money laundering and tax evasion.
Excerpts of the internal inquiry released on Friday night concluded there was no interference from Police Commissioner Angelo Gafà or the top brass for the arrest warrant not to be executed.
But administrative deficiencies led the e-mail request from the Germans to be ignored and therefore was not executed by the Maltese police.
Sources said it is not yet clear what disciplinary action, if any, will be taken against the Sirene inspector. The Sirene bureau responds to alerts received from other Schengen member states, give instructions if a positive hit to an alert is received in Malta, as well as enter an alert from the Maltese side.
While Galea had been subject to the European Arrest Warrant issued by German police since early last year, police sources told Times of Malta he travelled out of Malta at least twice more before he was finally arrested in Italy in May.
Another officer who was found responsible of administrative shortcoming is related to the limits of his discretion about whether to grant Galea leave from police bail.
Galea, who runs his own consultancy firm, was previously a compliance officer at the Malta Gaming Authority.
Maltese investigators believe he has since received sensitive insider information from within the regulator and may have passed this on to interested parties.
Galea had also appeared as a witness in the case against former European commissioner John Dalli’s top aide, Silvio Zammit.