Justice Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici yesterday decided to meet a prisoner claiming he knew who killed Raymond Caruana but walked away from police headquarters none the wiser.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici attended the interrogation of alleged murderer Kenneth Gafà, who claimed to know who committed the 1986 political murder but was only ready to reveal the name in the presence of the minister.

In return, he asked for certain privileges, including a lenient sentence if he were to be found guilty of murder, police sources said.

The police had suspected he was bluffing and the minister initially refused to attend, saying he had no power at law to investigate criminal acts.

He eventually turned up however, only for Mr Gafà – who was just a boy at the time of Mr Caruana’s murder – to confirm it was all a charade when he had no information to provide at all.

He was interrogated extensively by Police Commissioner John Rizzo.

The 38-year-old jockey from Marsa is in custody awaiting trial for the alleged murder of his former girlfriend, Christina Sammut, in Mġarr last December.

Raymond Caruana was gunned down while attending a reception at the Nationalist Party club in Gudja in December 1986 in what was to mark the apex of a politically tumultuous period that turned violent.

At the time, Pietru Pawl Busuttil, now mayor of Safi, was accused of the murder after the weapon was planted in his Safi farmhouse. He was later absolved of all accusations with the court confirming he was the victim of a frame-up.

Contacted earlier yesterday, Eddie Fenech Adami, former Prime Minister and leader of the Nationalist Party when the atrocious murder took place, said he was “not impressed at all” by Mr Gafà’s claim, adding that “it shouldn’t be given too much importance”.

Jimmy Caruana, Raymond’s brother, had expressed shock and disbelief on reading the report in another newspaper that a prisoner had been prepared to give that vital piece of information.