AFM Soldier Fired, Another Demoted After Safi Barracks Cannabis Theft

A soldier has been sacked and another has been demoted following an internal investigation into the circumstances in which over 100kg of cannabis was stolen from the Safi barracks.

ONE reported that the AFM took action against six soldiers, after they were found guilty of 55 internal charges.

One of the soldiers has been completely discharged and another has been demoted, while the others faced penalties amounting to 134 working days of forfeited pay, formal reprimands and official warnings.

An administrative inquiry by retired judge Geoffrey Valenzia found that a soldier was watching a film with earphones in while he was meant to be monitoring CCTV cameras on the night of the Safi barracks weed theft.

He didn’t conduct any patrols or check the container where the weed was located between 11:25pm and 2:50am.

Meanwhile, a bombardier who was also on duty fell asleep for two hours when he was supposed to be merely resting, meaning that he couldn’t have noticed his colleague wasn’t monitoring the cameras.

Valenzia described it as a remarkable “coincidence” that the thieves carried out the theft on a night when the soldiers on duty were distracted.

Footage shows them breaching a fence, breaking into a sealed container and making multiple trips for almost three hours. They even transported some of the weed to a garage in Ħaż-Żebbuġ before returning to the barracks to continue the robbery.