Former Sliema Mayor Nikki Dimech was paid more than €24,000 in commissions by a refuse contractor, a court was told today.
Police Inspector Angelo Gafa spoke about the commissions when he gave evidence before Magistrate Anthony Vella in the case against refuse contractor Joseph Vella, 56 of St Paul's Bay, was stands charged with bribery.
He is alleged to have paid then Mayor 10% commission on each payment that Sliema Council used to pay for waste collection.
Inspector Gafa said he started the investigation in September/October 2010 after he received information in anonymous letters. The first letter, received in September, mentioned six companies which were all Sliema council contractors, including Veljo Services, owned by Mr Vella.
In October 2010 he received another anonymous letter with specific allegations, including one that Mr Dimech was paid commissions by Mr Vella for waste collection.
The allegations also mentioned two other councillors.
The inspector said he checked Mr Dimech's HSBC and APS bank accounts and found cash and cheque deposits which were suspicious.
Veljo in August 2009 had reached agreement with Sliema Council for the collection of organic waste for €8,000 a month. In December 2009 Mr Dimech reached agreement with Veljo for extra collections over the Christmas period. The agreed rate was €14,700 a month over and above the original contract. This new arrangement stopped in April 2010.
Out of the suspicious deposits, eight cheques were traced back to Joe Vella or his wife.
Three cheques were of about €3,000 each, one was of €1,851, another of €1,850 and the other of €6,785. The last was of €2,329.
In January 2011 Inspector Gafa said he interrogated Mr Vella who admitted that he had paid various commissions to Mr Dimech. He explained that soon after signing the contracts, Mr Dimech called him to a meeting and asked him for a 10% commission on every payment made by the council.
Mr Vella told the police that he felt he had no choice as otherwise he feared the contracts would be stopped.
He used to deduct 18% VAT and then paid 10% on the remaining balance of the contracts to Mr Dimech. He used to hand Mr Dimech cheques, signed and with the amount in figures but without the payee and the amounts in words.
Mr Vella recognised the cheques when they were shown to him by the police, but said the payee was not in his handwriting.
Inspector Gafa explained that Mr Dimech wrote the cheques in the names of his mother Josephine, his girlfriend Valentina Rea, his own name, C&N Accounting Services, ND & Associates and VG Tiles Co. Ltd.
Mr Vella told the police that he stopped paying the commissions to Mr Dimech when he heard on the news that he was a drug addict.
Inspector Gafa said he also spoke to Victor Galea, a director of VG Tiles Ltd, who said that Mr Dimech was the company's accountant. He said that the signature on the back of the cheque was not his (Galea's) signature.
The police also spoke to Mr Dimech's mother and girlfriend. The former did not know about the cheques while the latter said Mr Dimech gave them to her to sign and she did so because he was the main breadwinner.
When he was arrested, Mr Dimech did not reply to questions.
The case continues.