Four men who had been charged with immoral actions suffered a violation of their fundamental human rights because the law was not clear on what such actions consisted of, the Constitutional Court ruled yesterday.
The men – Frank Cachia, 37, of Msida, Michael Ciappara, 71, of Cospicua, Mario Ciappara, 36, of Qawra and Anthony Azzopardi, 28, of Ħamrun – had been arraigned on various charges, including that of running a brothel, involving the premises Maximus in Buġibba.
The police had found four Romanian girls, wearing just bikinis or underwear, pole dancing and sitting at the bar chatting to customers.
The four men were acquitted in 2008.
The case went to the Court of Criminal Appeal, where the men’s defence lawyers claimed the fundamental human rights of the accused had been breached because the law did not define immoral actions.
The Constitutional Court, presided over by Mr Justice Joseph R. Micallef, declared yesterday the right to know what a crime consisted of was included with the right to a fair hearing. Each definition of a crime had to be clear so an individual could know when s/he was violating the law. This was the principle of certainty of the law, intended to assist an accused person in defending himself.
Case law of the European Court of Human Rights took into consideration the fact that, however clearly drafted a law might be, there was always an inevitable amount of judicial interpretation. Laws had to have a certain flexibility to handle changing circumstances and to avoid excessive rigidity.
The court noted that the four men had been charged with prostitution but the arrests were prompted by scantily dressed women dancing in the establishment, as well as lap dancing, topless dancing and strip tease. The crux of the charges against the accused was, therefore, that of having committed immoral actions.
The law was not clear on what constituted an immoral action and this led to uncertainty of the law in violation of the four men’s fundamental human rights, Mr Justice Micallef ruled. The wording of the law meant any investigation into the men’s guilt or innocence would almost wholly depend on the subjective opinion of the presiding judge.
The court, therefore, ordered the case to be sent back to the Court of Criminal Appeal, which would be able to hand down a decision according to this judgment.