There are better fish to fry

There are some court sittings that stand out in my memory – judge, parties, law-yers, courtroom – the whole shebang. I’m usually more interested in the human aspect of cases; the way people testify, their facial expression and mannerisms. I’m able to see a whole life beyond the case and tend to get lost in the story behind the story instead of the legalities.

I remember prosecuting a case one time. I took one look at the accused and instantly recognised the man, except I couldn’t put a finger on where or how I knew him.

It happens a lot – usually with people you may know by sight but not by name – postmen, delivery men, people who fill your car up with fuel. Whenever you meet these people outside of their professional habitat, the mind registers anonymous recognition.

That day, I couldn’t reconcile the face with the name that was showing up on the court list, and the whole time, instead of mentally preparing an intelligent cross examination, I was trying to figure out where it was I knew him.

And then I suddenly remembered. The gentleman manned a fruit and vegetable truck and would visit my neighbourhood Mondays and Thursdays. And, of course, when it was my turn to prosecute and potentially nail him, the only question I had for him was the one question I always screamed out of my car window, on my way home, every Thursday – ‘Bert, għandek frawli? (Do you have any strawberries?)

There was another case. It was a criminal appeal sitting upstairs. I wasn’t actually prosecuting or de-fending the accused at the time, but I was there waiting my turn. So I had the luxury of watching it all play out without having to think like a lawyer.

The accused, this time round, was a woman who had some sort of makeshift fish market in Birkirkara. She sold fish for a living in the mornings and had apparently failed to issue and hand a fiscal receipt to a woman whom she claimed had rushed off without it.

She was facing a colossal fine because of two lampuki (dolphin fish) that cost less than €5. I kept looking at the judge to see if I could read him and whether he was feeling as physically sick as I was at the amount this poor woman would have to cough up if the judgment was confirmed.

She looked visibly washed out – the sort of fishwife who was constrained to perform loaf and fish miracles every day to keep her own family alive. As far as I was concerned, the only fishy thing going on that day was the injustice that would prevail if the law were applied to the letter. I hoped that the judge would let this lady off the hook or at least find some extraordinary and special mitigating circumstance.

In court, these injustices are the order of the day. You wait your turn and assume a poker face but for the most part you know that on any day of the week, it could so easily have been you, the prosecutor, the judge or Tonio Fenech.

Policemen prosecute cases in-volving loud music and you happen to know that these very same policemen patronise and sometimes run local band clubs which, for the exact same reasons, have frequently kept you awake all night long.

It’s so easy to talk about corruption (in the widest possible rule-breaking sense) as something that only happens to other people and to actually delude yourself into thinking you are above and beyond it.

On a recent trip to Rome I sat down to an ice-cream at Giolitti, the famous ice cream parlour, and ordered a cone, only to be told that cones were not permitted to be eaten on the premises.

I am unable to eat ice-cream in a cup and enjoy it, and I had no wish to stand in the rain outside. I pleaded with the waiter and someone I was with immediately produced his wallet to pay for the ice-cream and told the waiter he could hang onto the change as a tip.

Suddenly the waiter disappeared and I was miraculously allowed to sit down at table with my cone. I thought about it afterwards – how, if a society is to function properly, if at all, turning a blind eye to allow for a certain leeway is not merely necessary, it’s sine qua non.

It was thanks to Facebook, and to people who feel compelled to post the minutiae of their lives and everything else that is going on, every 15 seconds, that I found out about the gaffe committed by Tonio Fenech which then led to the ‘Maid in Malta’ farce that was subsequently aired on Bondiplus.

Fenech’s decision to use his char as an example of someone cheating the system and ultimately cheating herself was a bad call and distasteful enough without him having to add to the distaste by dissociating himself from the deed and hiding behind a piece of legislation claiming he had done nothing illegal.

As Fenech will undoubtedly agree, not everything that is legal is necessarily acceptable. Ministers should lead by example, and given that he chose to use one which was too close to home and which made a mess of his doorstep, he should now have the decency and cajones to clean up his own mess.

A good start would be to acknowledge the myth of egalitarianism – because not everyone is equal before the law.

Many laws are unrealistic, antisocial and impossible to live up to. While some people are lucky enough to escape the law’s scrutiny because they happen to work behind closed doors for you, me or Fenech, others selling fruit, vegetables or fish for a living, are fined outrageous amounts that set them back for years, and lives and families are lost or ruined in the process.

You’d think there were better fish to fry. The system is best described by Bob Dylan: “Steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king.”

michelaspiteri@gmail.com