Caruana Galizia denies defaming Magistrate

Columnist Daphne Caruana Galizia this morning pleaded not guilty to defaming and harassing Magistrate Consuelo Scerri-Herrera in a number of blog contributions.

Ms Caruana Galizia made her ‘not guilty' plea in a packed court room before Magistrate Antonio Micallef Trigona at the opening of a case instituted by the police.

Early in the sitting, Ms Caruana Galizia's lawyer, Dr Roberto Montalto, asked the court to evict former PL General Secretary Jason Micallef and PL journalist Charlon Gouder from the court because they could be witnesses in the case.

Mr Micallef and Mr Gouder complained that they had not been notified that they were witnesses.

The court upheld the defence counsel's request and asked the two men to leave.

Dr Montalto then insisted that Magistrate Scerri-Herrera could not be represented by a private lawyer as she was a public official.

Dr Stephen Tonna Lowell, appearing parte civile, said this was a red herring. He said there was nothing in the law which said that public individuals could not be represented by private defence counsel. Indeed, even the Attorney General sometimes engaged private lawyers for technical cases.

The defence also argued that his client could not be accused of the same crime twice - with a similar case having been instituted at the request of Robert Musumeci.

Dr Tonna Lowell said he would reply on Monday.

Inspector Sandro Camilleri, prosecuting, said the prosecution was asking for the Court's protection for Magistrate Scerri-Herrera because the crime at issue was continuing.

Dr Montalto said the prosecution was throwing the presumption of innocence out of the window. There was nothing that Magistrate Scerri-Herrera needed to be protected from, he said.

The court said it assumed that the prosecution meant that blogs featuring Magistrate Scerri-Herrera were still being written.

The court said it would decide on Monday on the three points that had been raised.