‘Nobody could touch us’: Theuma details alleged network of crime and power

Melvin Theuma’s testimony in the trial by jury of Yorgen Fenech has continued to lay bare an extraordinary web in which alleged criminals, businessmen, political power and senior police figures appear to have operated in close proximity, with information flowing between them while those involved reassured each other that they were effectively untouchable.

What emerged in court was a description of an ecosystem in which advance warnings, police information and political connections allegedly moved through a chain of people until they reached individuals at the centre of the criminal investigation.

According to Theuma, Johann Cremona (Fenech’s former business partner) informed him that then-chief of staff Keith Schembri was passing information to Kenneth Camilleri, then a security official for former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, to Cremona, who would then relay it to Theuma.

The alleged chain is striking because of what the information was purportedly used for: keeping those involved abreast of what the police knew about them and whether they were under investigation.

The testimony also returned to the role of Silvio Valletta, the former deputy police commissioner who was initially responsible for aspects of the investigation into the murder.

Theuma said Valletta used to pass information to Fenech who, he recalled, was particularly concerned about Valletta being removed from the investigation, saying he did not want that to happen.

That detail carries particular significance given the Caruana Galizia family’s successful campaign to have Valletta removed from the investigation because of his marriage to former government minister Justyne Caruana. The family had argued that the relationship created a conflict of interest, and a court ultimately ordered Valletta’s removal from the inquiry into the murder.

Theuma also described meetings at Fenech’s farmhouse involving himself, Fenech and Cremona. The subject matter, according to his testimony, included money, the murder and the belief that the authorities had nothing against them.

In meetings also held in other locations, the men, he said, reassured one another that nobody could touch them.

Payments to the Degiorgio brothers (the perpetrators) were also discussed. Theuma said they considered stopping the weekly payments of between €2,000 and €3,000 being made to the brothers, but Cremona advised Fenech against doing so because the money was what gave them power over the Degiorgios.

The payments subsequently became an issue when the Degiorgios demanded €80,000.

The testimony also provided another glimpse into the paranoia surrounding the group. Theuma said he feared Fenech was trying to poison him.

At another meeting, while the two men were discussing the murder, Fenech allegedly told Theuma that he had “messed everything up”.

Cremona allegedly told him that he was being investigated over financial crimes. Fenech, according to Theuma, reassured him that if Ray Aquilina was the officer who arrested him, he would have nothing to fear.

Cremona also allegedly told Theuma that he would receive the questions police intended to ask him in advance and would be able to select which questions were removed. The questions, Theuma said, never arrived.

He nevertheless claimed that both Fenech and Cremona warned him that he was going to be arrested in November. He said he knew two days beforehand.

Taken together, the testimony depicts an investigation in which the people suspected of serious crimes allegedly had access to information about police activity while senior figures in the political and law enforcement establishment were allegedly part of the information chain.

Theuma’s cooperation with investigators was secured through a presidential pardon. He told the court that the pardon was not limited to the murder of Caruana Galizia. It also covered money laundering and a series of other crimes.

Among these was the 2010 robbery of HSBC’s Balzan branch, in which around €1 million was stolen. The pardon also covered the failed robbery at HSBC’s Qormi premises in the same year and the Casino di Venezia robbery.

This is an important part of the context surrounding Theuma’s testimony. The prosecution’s case rests, in part, on evidence from a man who was himself deeply embedded in the criminal underworld and who received extraordinary legal protection in exchange for cooperating with the authorities.

The jury heard more of Theuma’s recordings of Fenech, largely on the matters he raised in his earlier testimonies. Fenech knew Theuma was recording him, saying “he was disappointed”.  Among things said in the recordings was that Fenech allegedly said that Keith Schembri wanted to burn Caruana Galizia 100 times over.

The wider picture emerging from his testimony is one in which the murder of a journalist became entangled with a network of money, criminal activity, political influence and access to police information – and in which those at the heart of that network could allegedly reassure one another that the state could not reach them.

The jury will ultimately have to decide what weight to give Theuma’s evidence and whether it establishes Fenech’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

The trial continues on Monday.