Just eight people knew of the imminent arrests of the three men charged with carrying out the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, including Malta’s Former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and his Chief of Staff Keith Schembri, Lovin Malta is informed.

The information was leaked to murder suspect Yorgen Fenech.

Chief Homicide Inspector Keith Arnaud has confirmed with the courts that he and former Deputy Police Commissioner Silvio Valletta shared the information with Muscat and Schembri “the Thursday” before the arrest on 5th December 2017.

Middleman Melvin Theuma has also told the courts that Fenech shared the details with him the very same Thursday. Theuma would go on to inform Alfred Degiorgio, George Degiorgio, and Vince Muscat later that day.

Sources were reluctant to provide the identities of the other four individuals who knew about the arrest. However, they are believed to include key figures in Malta’s Secret Service.

A series of court sittings have uncovered that Fenech had intimate knowledge about the investigation, with the names of Schembri, Muscat, Valletta, and Arnaud littered throughout Theuma’s secret recordings of the murder suspect.

Fenech insists that his close friend Keith Schembri kept him regularly updated on details from the case, including Vince Muscat’s potential pardon and that his phone was wiretapped. He also claims that Schembri received this information directly from Arnaud and Valletta.

Arnaud has confirmed that he did keep Muscat and Schembri regularly updated on the case during official briefings on the matter. He has described these briefings as unprecedented in homicide investigations.

Sources who spoke to Lovin Malta claimed that it was Castille who first initiated the briefings which began shortly after Caruana Galizia was assassinated.

The briefings would continue for the next two years, only stopping a month before Fenech and Theuma were arrested in connection with the murder.

The police’s case against Yorgen Fenech continues this Thursday at 10am. You can follow it live on Lovin Malta’s live blog.