This Is The Facebook Post About Rosianne Cutajar That Got Mark Camilleri In Trouble With The Police
Police have charged author and former PL delegate Mark Camilleri with harassing and taunting PL MP Rosianne Cutajar over a Facebook post he wrote back in October 2021.
With Camilleri away from Malta and Cutajar’s lawyers reluctant to let him testify via videoconferencing, the case looks set to be beset by legal wrangling and raise debate about free speech.
This is what the case is about.
On 28th October 2021, Cutajar sued Camilleri for libel after he claimed in his book A Rent Seeker’s Paradise that she had an affair with murder suspect Yorgen Fenech to advance herself politically and that the murder suspect gave her “corrupt money” on the pretence that she helped him broker a property deal.
A day later, Camilleri offered Cutajar a “trade” – he would delete all his posts about her, including a NFT he had minted of her libel announcement, if she quits politics for good.
“I will remove my posts about you including my NFT of you if you resign from politics completely,” he wrote. “You will never hear of me again if you leave politics.”
“Your alternative is this. Stay in politics, keep up your libel case and I will become your worst nightmare.”
Camilleri attached to this warning a conversation between Fenech and businesswoman Diane Izzo about an impassioned speech Cutajar gave in Parliament during a debate on 17 Black, Fenech’s Dubai-based company linked to government corruption.
Lovin Malta had already reported on this chat a few months earlier.
Cutajar reported Camilleri to the police and the Cybercrime Unit decided to press charges against him for “threatening” and “taunting” her by warning her that he will become “her worst nightmare” unless she quits politics for good.
Cutajar’s lawyers have said they would Camilleri to be questioned on the stand but the author has played down suggestions he could return to Malta.
“There is zero probability I will go to Valletta any time soon to explain to the court why Rosianne Cutajar is a crook who did illicit business with another crook – it’s the police who should be doing that job,” he wrote in a blogpost.
He said it is “bizarre” that a criminal case is taking place against him while Cutajar is still in politics.“Justice is so perverted and crazy in Malta that impunity reigns and freedom of speech are suppressed,” he said.
“I have the privilege to comfortably remove myself from the entanglements of a corrupt State. Rosianne is part of the Joseph Muscat cabal and her lawyer, Edward Gatt, is also one of the prime lawyers of this cabal having regularly defended Keith Schembri as well.”
“This is the same cabal that murdered a journalist and practically got away with it. I’d rather die than play a game on their own terms with a State that backs them and supports them. Never again. Kiss my glorious Marxist ass Rosianne.”
What do you make of this case?
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