A Tunisian man serving life in jail for four murders in 1988 has seen his application for a review of his sentence thrown out.
Ben Ali Wahid Ben Hassine’s request was first rejected by a Parole Board last month and told to reapply in five years’ time but he filed an appeal asking the courts to treat it with urgency. But this request was turned down last Thursday, with a judge saying the court needed to take its decisions without any undue haste.
The Tunisian was convicted in February 1992, along with co-national Mohsen Bin Brahim Mosbah, of the murder of two taxi drivers and another two men, one British and the other French, in 1988. The killing spree shocked Malta.
The two men admitted to killing James Reed at Ta’ Xbiex on a yacht on February 12, 1988, and Alfred Cucciardi, a taxi driver, on the same night. Six days later, they killed taxi driver Alfred Darmanin and Frenchman Michel Levarlet. The two were sentenced to life imprisonment and the court recommended that Mr Ben Hassine serve a minimum of 22 years.
There are 14 prisoners currently serving life sentences at the Corradino Correctional Facility.
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Mr Ben Hassine has already been behind bars for 25 years but last November he controversially won the right to apply for a review of his sentence.
In a judgment, the Court of Appeal called upon the legislator to provide for a mechanism intended to reduce a life sentence. Drawing on EU case-law, the appeal court declared that the absence of such a mechanism constituted a violation of the right to protection against inhuman treatment as safeguarded by the Constitution.
Four months later, Mr Ben Hassine complained to the court that no remedy had yet been provided by Parliament.
The Attorney General argued that amendments to the Reparative Justice Act were being discussed in Parliament but the Court of Appeal, presided over by Chief Justice Silvio Camilleri, Mr Justice Giannino Caruana Demajo and Mr Justice Noel Cuschieri, observed that such amendments did not envisage any possible reduction of a life sentence but rather provided for the granting of parole. Consequently, the court remitted the matter to the Parole Board which last month decided against Mr Ben Hassine’s request.
The board, which did not make its decision public, is chaired by retired judge Franco Depasquale.
The board was meant to assess whether Mr Ben Hassine has registered significant progress in his road to rehabilitation in such manner as to no longer pose a threat to other individuals and to society at large.
But in the appeal filed before the courts against the Parole Board’s decision, Mr Ben Hassine claimed that the board had reached its conclusion in violation of the principles of natural justice as he had not been given the opportunity to defend his case.
Mr Justice Joseph R. Micallef ruled that the appeal was not so urgent as there was no irremediable action from which he was suffering and therefore did not merit to skip other cases.