Economic Crimes Inspector Jonathan Ferries said in court today that during their course of investigations, auditor Joe Sammut accused investigators of hindering Libyan investment to Malta.
The former Labour Party treasurer and candidate is facing charges of money laundering, fraud and misappropriation over allegations that he assisted Libyan nationals obtain residency permits by creating fake companies. The court decided that there is enough prima facie evidence for the case to continue.
Inspector Ferris explained that three evidence bags full of documents had been collected from Mr Sammut's office. Mr Sammut had expressed concern that the documents would be tampered with while in the custody of police and requested that each and every document is photocopied there and then, he said.
Inspector Ferris said that he opposed Mr Sammut’s suggestion because there were volumes of documents and the process would take too long. To assure Mr Sammut that the documents would not be tampered with, Inspector Ferris sealed the evidence bags in the accountant's presence until the documents were eventually photocopied some days later. The process took some three days, Inspector Ferris said. He said that the police are still reviewing the content of the documents.
It also emerged in court that a number of Libyan nationals who engaged in the residency scheme and formed a fake company claimed to have purchased items of over 110,000 euros worth of medicines and cans of tuna from Maltese companies to make good for the 110,000-euro cash investment requisite to get a residency and work permit.
The law stipulates that in order to be granted a single work permit, one has to provide a share capital amounting to 110,000 euros. Most of the companies opted to make use of a non-cash consideration clause and claimed to have purchased the items from Malta reaching the amount stipulated or more. But when police investigated further and interviewed the directors of the local companies to verify whether the items were in fact sold to the Libyan nationals applying for the residency permit, it resulted that the “mega purchases” were never made by the Libyan companies.
The invoices of the ‘purchased’ items were discovered by police attached to the company formation applications – rubber-stamped by Mr Sammut’s office. The invoices bore the letterheads of the local companies.
The Libyan nationals are understood to have said that they purchased the medicines from Lister Pharmacy and containers worth of tuna from a local company.
Sammut’s employees jobless
Three employees of Mr Sammut refused to take the witness stand, arguing that they can incriminate themselves if they testified. The employees are currently without a job since they cannot approach Mr Sammut.
Superintendent Paul Vassallo told the court that the police are still expected to interview a Libyan national in connection with the case but the police have not yet established contact with the man. He said that the police initially acted on reports made by the Citizenship and Expatriate Affairs Department after the department realised that most of the companies which were applying for the permit through the formation of a company were using the same addresses but were not making use of the properties where they registered their companies.
The case is set to continue on 9 October at 9 a.m.