The 75-year-old “whistleblower” in the Rita Schembri case was yesterday granted bail following the testimonies of five witnesses that were characterised by complicated evidence.
Joe Borg, who had been under preventative arrest since Saturday, was released after making a deposit of €2,000 and personal guarantee of €8,000.
He had been charged on Saturday with sending a defamatory e-mail in which he allegedly attempted to blackmail Ms Schembri, who is the head of the Government’s internal audit bureau (IAID).
Ms Schembri is also a member of the European anti-fraud office OLAF and at the centre of an investigation that she requested for allegedly breaching ethics.
Taking the witness stand, Ms Schembri said she received the threatening message through a generic e-mail address. She filed a police report after consulting her lawyer Pio Valletta.
In the e-mail, Mr Borg who had previously rented his restaurant to Ms Schembri and her husband Mark, said he was giving her “24 hours to redeem herself” and pay back money she owed to a Nigerian couple, Ben Kinsley and his wife, and Omar Granata, a Maltese citizen, to whom she had sub-let the property in violation of the contract.
Both had paid the Schembris key money, which they never got back when they were kicked out of the property after it was established that the premises had been wrongly sublet to them.
Mr Borg said he would file a report to OLAF and expose Ms Schembri’s “mischievous behaviour”.
Ms Schembri said she felt threatened because she had never been ordered to pay anything to anyone and this was confirmed by a court that “found in her favour”.
However, her claim was disputed by defence lawyer Edward Debono, who pointed out that the courts in 2009 had actually ruled against the Schembris and in favour of Mr Borg.
In that same judgment, three judges had said the Schembris tried to hide their breach of contract through “raggiri” (underhand manoeuvres). This, Dr Debono said, proved that Ms Schembri and her husband defrauded Mr Kingsley and Mr Granata and therefore owed them the key money they had taken.
The Kingsley couple eventually left the island but Mr Granata pursued the sum of €28,000, which he had wrongly been asked to pay in key money in 2003.
This was confirmed by Mr Granata, who testified he had paid the couple, unaware that Mr Borg was seeking to legally evict Ms Schembri and her husband from the property.
He himself was also evicted in 2009 but eventually signed a new contract with Mr Borg, in which Mr Borg also asked for key money of €28,000 and told him that he could get the money back from the Schembris.
Mr Borg took Mr Granata to his own lawyer to get the money back, but Mr Granata later abandoned proceedings because he did not have faith in the legal system.
The issue was only raised again last month when former EU Commissioner John Dalli resigned, Mr Granata added.
Taking the witness stand, Mr Borg’s son-in-law, Simon Balzan, said he knew Mr Granata and his brother Chris, who is a policeman.
He said Chris Granata told him that Omar Granata said Mr Schembri had approached him, saying that for €10,000 he knew someone who could beat up Mr Borg and have him thrown in the sea to kill him.
This was denied by Omar Granata on the witness stand.
Asked why he did not file a police report, Mr Balzan said he told Mr Borg about what was said and it was up to him to make a report.
At this point, Magistrate Anthony Vella remarked that he found it strange that Mr Granata, a policeman, did not make a report himself about such a serious matter.
The case continues.