11-Hour Vitals Sitting Annulled Over ‘Defective Notification’
After 11 hours in the ringer, the court decided to annul a sitting which saw former deputy prime Minister Chris Fearne and Central Bank CEO Edward Scicluna plead “not guilty” to fraud charges.
This was decided because one of the entities on the charge list wasn’t properly notified of the sitting.
Wednesday’s session was the first of the court proceedings against Fearne and Scicluna, as well as three permanent secretaries and nine officials charged with fraud and other crimes over their alleged roles in the Vitals Global Healthcare hospitals deal.
In the last hour of the hearing, the lawyers defending DF Advocates highlighted that the name was just a trade name, not a legal entity, Times of Malta reported.
Meanwhile, the company number on the charge sheet belonged to “DF Corporate Advisory Limited,” a company that didn’t exist at the time of the alleged crimes and for which charges had already been withdrawn.
The defense pointed out that since “DF Advocates” was not a proper legal entity, it had not been properly notified of the charges. They argued that if a natural person were not present, the proceedings could not continue, and the same should apply to a juridical person.
On the other hand, Prosecuting lawyers insisted that DF Advocates was duly represented by its officials, who had been notified. They argued that someone must answer for the alleged criminal activities.
The officials are chief financial officer Kenneth Deguara and lawyers Kevin Deguara and Jean Carl Farrugia.
After a substantial back and forth, the court found that DF Advocates had not been properly notified as a legal entity. Only its officials were notified in their personal capacities, which was not sufficient according to the presiding Magistrate Leonard Caruana.
Subsequently, the case has been deferred to June, meaning that the whole sitting must be redone and the prosecution must amend the errors on the charge sheet.
Subsequently the magistrate decided to defer the case to 11th June, meaning that the whole sitting must be redone and the prosecution must amend the errors on the charge sheet.
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