The charred body of Gaetano Romano was discovered in the furnace of his father’s gypsum workshop, a day after his 20th birthday, in 2009. Ten years on, the perpetrator of the gruesome murder remains at large.

Shortly before the body was discovered by his own father in Buġibba, the young man, who was found with six nails in his head, had written a letter expressing fears for his life and naming a suspect.

The murder in Damascus Road was the first of the year for 2009. 

The young Sicilian man worked at his father's shop Cinque Stelle Services, situated right next to the place where his corpse was found.

Investigators initially believed a nail gun could have been used to shoot the tacks into the young man's head but such a weapon was not found.

Given this, police sources had said investigators were not ruling out the possibility that the nails were hammered in his skull.

Three suspects had been held a few days following the discovery of the body - they included a relative of his father, a man in his 30s, as well as a Maltese and a "Yugoslav" who were close friends of the victim but who were reported to have had a number of arguments with him. They were all released.

The grim find came after his father Nicola, who was abroad, had made several failed attempts to contact his son.

Neighbours had told Times of Malta that when Nicola did not find his son at home, he forced open the door to his garage.

They saw Gaetano's father crying and banging on a low wall near the garage.

The family's dog had been killed eight months before and found rolled in a carpet in a nearby field. A neighbour said the family had even received photos of the dead dog.

Their gypsum business was at the centre of a controversy in the previous months when residents complained he was operating an illegal furnace, which they feared could blow up at any moment.

Nicola Romano opens the industrial oven where he found the charred body of his son, who was murdered three months ago. Photo: Jason Borg.

'My son knew who was going to kill him' 

Nearly three months after the gruesome discovery, Nicola said his son had written a letter which showed he feared for his life, naming the man he was afraid of as someone close to the family.

Nicola found the letter, which had been written "in case something happened to him”, in his office shortly after finding his body.

"If something happens to me, you know who to look for - you don't have far to look," Mr Romano said quoting the letter.

He had once also told his father that he would die young.

"They took away my son and they took away my life," Nicola Romano said.

He added that his son was everything to him: "When his mother died, I was his father, mother, friend, cousin - everything."

Gaetano Romano's Maltese mother died aged 45, when he was preparing for his confirmation.