The two remaining lawyers of disgraced OPM Chief of Staff Keith Schembri had a big falling out with Economy Minister Chris Cardona earlier this year, Lovin Malta has learnt.

Cardona made headlines in the past weeks when it emerged that Schembri could have been trying to frame him for the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. According to various court testimonies and police statements, Schembri passed on a note to main suspect Yorgen Fenech through their mutual doctor, urging Fenech to pin the assassination on Cardona. 

Last week Lovin Malta reported that one of Schembri’s lawyers, Edward Gatt, was no longer friends with Cardona despite having been childhood buddies.

Lovin Malta has now obtained more information about the real reason the two are no longer friends, and the story involves Mark Vassallo, the other legal representative of Schembri. 

Vassallo, who began his career at Where’s Everybody, started working in Cardona’s legal practice as a law student and eventually made it to partner. Later he even married Cheryl Azzopardi, the daughter of Cardona’s close associate and former Chief of Staff Mario Azzopardi.

When Cardona was appointed Minister in 2013, he left his entire legal practice to Vassallo.

However, instead of continuing Cardona’s practice, Vassallo ditched the firm and merged with Cardona’s childhood friend Gatt, who he had met through the Economy Minister himself.

This merger was done behind Cardona’s back who only got to know about it last June and was furious at both of them for having betrayed his trust.

Even though Gatt recently told Lovin Malta that him and Cardona were good friends, Cardona said this when asked: “We don’t meet any longer. Our friendship goes way back but we have grown apart. We haven’t spoken for weeks. I respect his job. I know he is a lawyer and he has to do his job, obviously within ethical parameters.”

Gatt and Vassallo are now Schembri’s last remaining lawyers. Pawlu Lia and Alex Sciberras have in recent weeks renounced their briefs with Schembri who is officially under investigation for the assassination of Caruana Galizia as well as various other crimes.

Cardona last week urged the Labour Party to oust Schembri, prompting the former Chief of Staff of the Prime Minister to step down himself.

Times of Malta recently reported that the ‘frameup’ letter which was allegedly passed on from Schembri to Fenech through doctor Adrian Vella was not sent for in-depth forensic testing as police believe it is already compromised.

“The note changed hands a number of times and is far too contaminated for testing to provide any reliable insight into where it came from at this point,” a source close to the murder probe said.

However, Cardona has asked for the letter to be analysed anyway.

“The letter was apparently typed out and had scribbles on it, so while there are certainly some tests that can be done on the printed text, at the very least the handwriting should be analysed by a calligrapher,” he told Lovin Malta yesterday when contacted.

Cardona recently told Lovin Malta that he never accused Schembri of coordinating a frameup.

“But somebody wrote that letter,” he said.