The family of murder victim Paul Degabriele, known as Is-Suldat, has lost a libel suit against a newspaper that referred to him as a dangerous criminal.
Magistrate Francesco Depasquale said this description was justified in the context of Mr Degabriele’s criminal record, given its “never-ending” list of offences and convictions from when Mr Degabriele was 15.
Anna Maria, Nadesh and Ryan Degabriele complained that the front page article of Il-Mument on June 16, 2013, two weeks after Mr Degabriele was shot dead, had implicated him in high-profile murders over the preceding months. The suit was filed against the paper’s editor, Roderick Agius.
Mr Degabriele, 48, of Fgura, was gunned down outside Sammy’s Bar in Belt il-Ħazna Road, Marsa, at about 11am on May 31, 2013, by an unknown man, who escaped in a stolen white Nissan Vannette driven by an accomplice.
Mr Degabriele had just stepped out of the bar and was sitting in his Toyota pickup when he was shot three times in the head and twice in his upper body. A semi-automatic 9mm pistol was used, according to the police.
The magistrate said ‘dangerous criminal’ was fair in the context of his ‘never-ending’ criminal record
In October 2012, Mr Degabriele reported to the police that a bomb had been placed under the Toyota. The device was safely detonated by ordnance experts.
Two months later, he was among those questioned about the murder of Joseph Cutajar, known as Il-Lion, who was found dead in his car in Mosta a few hours after Josef Grech, Il-Yo Yo, 41, of Balzan, was fatally shot in the head in Baħar iċ-Ċagħaq. Mr Degabriele was released without being charged.
Magistrate Depasquale said that, although Mr Degabriele’s wife and children told the court he had never had any problems with justice and had never been to court except for once when he was fined €400, his criminal record, filed by the police during the libel case, showed otherwise.
The record contained a long list of convictions, ranging from breaching the peace in a number of fights to the theft of cars and jewellery. He was convicted of crimes committed from 1983 to 2006.
In 2001, he was convicted for a string of thefts in 1984, when he was just 17. He stole €87,000 in gold and silver from jewellery shops in Valletta, Sliema and Birkirkara and €7,000 in cash and items from a self-service in Sliema.
He was also convicted of having stolen three cars and numerous car stereos from cars parked in Sliema, San Ġwann and Msida. The court also noted that, when he was murdered, he was due to be charged in court over the January 2005 theft of a refrigerated van full of frozen meats.
“With a criminal record like this, the court is incredulous how the family could attempt to object to a description of Mr Degabriele as a dangerous criminal... their claims on his past were also untrue, if not misleading, when seen in the context of the never-ending list of convictions and crimes,” the magistrate said.
The court also commented on the story published in the newspaper, describing it as the result of “meticulous research” of a series of crimes and murders “that remained unsolved through no fault of the police but because of the omertà that reigns in the circle of organised crime, in which Mr Degabriele was well-known”.