Sometime after the badly decomposed body of a 20-year-old woman, previously reported missing, was found at sea, her tormented friend told the police he had seen her overdose on heroin after a man injected her with the drug.
A few days after the body of Therese Agius was found, about 11 miles off the coast of Delimara, her friend Pawlu Micallef – known as the body builder – went to the police to open up about what he had witnessed on the night of October 1, 1999, Police Superintendent Carmelo Magri told jurors at the start of a murder trial.
Mr Micallef recounted how he was present when Joseph Azzopardi, known as Iz-Ziki Zok, injected Ms Agius with heroin on her request. Mr Micallef said he cautioned Mr Azzopardi not to give her more drugs since she had taken pills and already looked high.
Superintendent Magri was testifying before Mr Justice Lawrence Quintano in the trial of Mr Azzopardi, 40, of Tarxien. He is pleading not guilty to the murder of Ms Agius and trafficking in heroin in October, 1999.
Superintendent Magri said the testimony of Mr Micallef, who died in 2006, was pivotal in police investigations.
Mr Micallef described how, after Mr Azzopardi injected the young woman – in a Gżira apartment where she prostituted herself – she started foaming at the mouth, turned blue, fell to the ground and started shaking.
He recommended calling an ambulance but Mr Azzopardi refused for fear of ending up in court, adding this was not the first time this had happened and she would be fine. He then saw Mr Azzopardi wrap Ms Agius in a sheet and carry her to his van, thinking he was going to take her to some hospital.
The following day, October 2, Ms Agius was reported missing by her parents.
A few weeks later, on October 12, her badly decomposed body was found by a man on a boat out at sea.
Her body was tied around the neck, wrists and ankles, the superintendent said. Ms Agius’s sister, Charmaine, identified the body after recognising her clothes, a heart-shaped tattoo on her back with the name Silvio near it, and a ring which the sisters shared.
The missing person’s report became a murder investigation and police questioned several people, including the accused.
Investigators also spoke to Charlie Debono, known as Il-Maradona or It-Tobby, who owned two apartments in the notorious Testaferrata Street, Gżira.
Mr Debono was a pimp who lived with two women and rented out another apartment to Ms Agius and another two prostitutes who each paid him Lm5 (about €12) a day. Ms Agius lived with her parents in Paola and had to be home by 1 a.m.
Initially police investigations were derailed by a fabricated version of events built up by people living in the area. This was aimed at protecting Mr Azzopardi who himself changed his versions when questioned by the police but insisted on denying his involvement in her death.
In the first statement to the police, on October 14, Mr Azzopardi said he had known Ms Agius for three months through her boyfriend Silvio Buttigieg, known as Iż-Żingla, whose name she had tattooed on her back. When Mr Buttigieg ended up in jail, Mr Azzopardi started dating her.
Mr Azzopardi said he last saw Ms Agius the day before she went missing when he took her to Gżira, for work, and waited for her in his van but she never returned.
Some time after that, Mr Micallef told the police what he had seen. Ms Agius went to the Gżira apartment on October 1, 1999, after a long absence as she was attending a drug rehabilitation programme.
Mr Micallef met her and Mr Azzopardi there, after buying drugs from a certain Lawrence Attard known as Wenzu l-Għawdxi. Ms Agius had bought heroin for her and Mr Azzopardi who injected it into her arm since she did not know how.
That was when Mr Micallef saw her overdose and Mr Azzopardi take her away wrapped in a sheet.
In a second statement, which Mr Azzopardi released on January 30, 2000, he was confronted with this new information. He insisted on not having anything to do with Ms Agius’s death but chose not to reply to most questions.
Superintendent Magri said Mr Micallef later told him he had been threatened to change his version. Mr Micallef had been arraigned for heroin possession and admitted to the charge.
As prosecuting lawyer Aaron Bugeja, from the Attorney General’s office, outlined his case to jurors, he said this was the end of a tragic story that started 11 years ago and was “like watching a scary movie”.
“I’m showing you Therese’s photo because you are not going to see her... All you will see is the face of a skeleton,” he said while holding up a picture of the pretty 20-year-old.
Police inspector Ramon Cassar, who was a scene-of-crime officer at the time, said Ms Agius had been tied with three strands of rope. The rope went around her ankles, over the waist and round to her back, where her wrists were tied, and continued being wrapped around her neck.
Inspector Cassar pointed out that this type of tie, known as hogtie, made it easy for a body to be carried “like a handbag”.
Superintendent Sharon Tanti, who investigated the missing person’s report, said that prostitutes she spoke to said it was unlike Ms Agius not to call her mother since she phoned her every day.
Lawyer Malcolm Mifsud is representing Mr Azzopardi.