Waylon Johnston
Criminal charges filed against columnist
Criminal charges have been filed against Daphne Caruana Galizia following a request by Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera for the police to investigate allegations made by the columnist on her blog.
Legal sources confirmed that the charges had been filed and that the case was assigned to Magistrate Antonio Micallef Trigona. Alas, a copy of the charge sheet was not available.
A date still has to be set for the columnist to be formally charged.
Ms Caruana Galizia is expected to be accused of defamation "by means of writings" and harassment, which carry a prison term of more than a year.
Magistrate Scerri Herrera had filed a police report to "protect her integrity" from allegations made on the blog and had also abstained from presiding over two unrelated libel hearings involving Ms Caruana Galizia on February 4.
Ms Caruana Galizia's allegations against the magistrate were made on January 29 in a series of blog posts on her website, Daphne Caruana Galizia's Notebook, Running Commentary. In a series of blog entries over the past two weeks, Ms Caruana Galizia has lambasted the magistrate, arguing that aspects of her personal life were inappropriate for someone in her position.
Ms Caruana Galizia has said she was "petitioning the Chief Justice" to get the magistrate off the libel cases in question.
One of them was instituted by the head of the defunct Alleanza Nazzjonali Repubblikana, Martin Degiorgio, against Ms Caruana Galizia and the other was by the columnist against the editor of Labour's online portal Maltastar.
The Justice Minister had said he took some of the allegations levelled at the magistrate very seriously. Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici said yesterday the Commission for the Administration of Justice had noted the allegations and that the police were investigating the matter.
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Antoine Vella
Feb 15th 2010, 00:48
G.Schembri
"@c.camilleri Can you substantiate your allegations, ...."
I am not c.camilleri but I have understood perfectly what he is referring to. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the case of the former police commissioner.
M. J. Mallia
Feb 14th 2010, 19:41
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20100214/religion/unguilded-silence
J Galea
Feb 13th 2010, 22:33
I have no knowledge or interest in this case but I do note that Criminal libel is a dying species in the developed democratic world with an action in tort being the usual way of settling a matter like this, if indeed the written words are libellous. If matters are so serious for criminal libel to be considered, you would imagine the Attorney-General should sanction such a measure and not a political figure, even if the latter is versed in the law. The police should act on a request from the AG not an individual person involved in the case, whether that be a magistrate, the chief justice or any other mortal for that matter. "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it" said Voltaire. Whilst defamation is a wrong and where proven should be remedied, free speech should not be sacrificed on an altar of authority without proper investigations in line with proper procedure.
G.Schembri
Feb 13th 2010, 18:41
@c.camilleri Can you substantiate your allegations, by giving examples of comments on the Media which compare to Daphne's on her blog. Criminal charges where filed "following a request by Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera for the police to investigate allegations made by the columnist on her blog." If you were following DCG's blog you would know how serious her allegations about the Magistrate were.
c. camilleri
Feb 13th 2010, 16:42
I think that before the Police started filing criminal charges against Daphne, it should investigate whether what was written by the writer is true or not. This is the starting point. In other similar cases the media was not in any way called by the police. On the contrary the pressure put by the media on the person concerned made him resign from his position.
Are we witnessing two weights and two measures? Is freedom of the speech and writings now being selected.
M. J. Mallia
Feb 13th 2010, 08:32
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20100212/local/allegations-against-magistrate-noted-by-commission-for-administration-of-justice