I refer to an online article (July 15) titled ‘Court issues warrant of seizure over assets of Times of Malta journalists at request of Paul Pace, ex-MUMN president’.

In the first place, it is clear that the garnishee order in question was issued at the request of all four plaintiffs and not at the sole request of ex-MUMN president as reported in the title of the said article, and hence the choice of title, apart from being factually incorrect, was evidently chosen for the purposes of sensationalism.

From the comments posted on the online blog, your readers have taken the cue given by the article’s title and chose to direct their comments more at the fact that Mr Pace now happens to be a government consultant, and went so far as to opine that the issuance of the garnishee order constituted an attack orchestrated by a person appointed by the present government on the freedom of the press, something which you know full well to be wholly incorrect and unfounded.

It is clear that the position which Mr Pace occupies today is completely irrelevant and had absolutely no bearing on the merits of the case or on its determination.

It is to be brought to the attention of your readers that the garnishee order was issued after a final judgment has been given by the Court of Appeal and that the said judgment constitutes executive title in terms of law.

Your readers should also be informed that the said garnishee order was only issued now, six months after the said judgment was delivered, and that my clients allowed the defendants sufficient time to honour the judgment which had been given and also went beyond what was required from them in terms of law by calling upon defendants by means of a letter to effect payment as ordered in the said final judgment prior to requesting the issuance of the garnishee order after sufficient time elapsed and defendants still failed to honour the said final judgment.

This shows that my clients have shown the utmost prudence in the manner in which they addressed their legitimate right to request and finally to execute the court judgment and, to quote your good self, this really ‘says much about them’ and the kind of people my clients’ are. They are certainly not money-hungry rogues as your article attempts to depict them.

Your readers should also be informed that, under our legal system, there is no appeal from a judgment delivered by the Court of Appeal, as in the case in question. Hence your statement that ‘an appeal is still pending’ is wholly untrue, incorrect and misleading.

Your readers should further be informed that my clients had every right to request the issuance of a precautionary garnishee order both at the stage when the case was still being heard in front of the Court of Magistrates and even more so during the appellate stage, but have chosen to refrain from doing so. They only proceeded to request the issuance of a garnishee order six months after the final judgment and after their request for payment went unheeded.

With regard to the constitutional case which you quote in your article, it is to be pointed out that my clients have not been notified with any such case, and that it would transpire from an online search in the Ministry of Justice website that no such constitutional case has as yet been filed.

If this results to be correct, then I believe that an apology is owed by the Times of Malta to its readers and this would further fortify the distinct impression which one gets from reading this article that perhaps emotions have been allowed to get in the way of facts.

Furthermore, there is no provision of law which stipulates that the filing of a constitutional case following the final determination of a case by means of a judgment given by a court of appeal automatically results in a stay of execution of the said judgment, contrary to the impression entertained by a number of bloggers who chose to comment on the said article.

It would also be pertinent to assure your readers that although the garnishee order was also issued against the journalists’ employer, the first €699.98 of their wages are protected and therefore there is no fear that they will become destitute, as one of your bloggers suggested. Also, as soon as the sum ordered by the court is paid, the garnishee order will immediately be lifted.

With regards to the comments made in your article on the actual merits of the case and the judgment which was delivered, my clients purposely choose to refrain from comment out of a sense of respect to the authority of the court.

Yours truly,

Chris Cilia, LL.D.

Editor’s note: The above editorial deals with most points raised here. Not only was the Constitutional Court case filed, but it was appointed for hearing on June 11, 2015 (see above image). Unfortunately the sitting had to be deferred to October 22, so please accept our apologies for being truthful. We would also like to express our heartfelt gratitude to the plaintiffs for allowing us to have €699.98 of our monthly salary. We will try not to spend all the money at once.