A magistrates’ court yesterday played host to another batch of 20 people accused of obtaining their nautical licence illegally.

Before magistrate Michael Mallia, six men pleaded guilty to trading in influence, making false declarations and making use of forged documents. These were Jesmond Aquilina, James Falzon, Generoso Grima, Kevin Micallef, Christopher Sant and Nicholas Anthony Tanti. They were each sentenced to a one year jail term suspended for two years, fined Lm500 and banned from obtaining a nautical license for a year. This is the same sentence imposed on the four men who pleaded guilty to the same charges on Tuesday.

Lawyer Robert Abela, appearing on an accused’s behalf who pleaded not guilty, contested that the one year license suspension is not just as this punishment is only given when a crime has been committed when a boat is in use.

The other 14, one of whom is a woman, either pleaded not guilty, were not notified to appear in court, or asked for their case to be put off in order to regularise their position prior to filing a plea.

Two MMA officials have been charged in court in connection with the case. John Farrugia, 60, who works as a small ships administrator at the authority and Ivan Muscat, 30, a clerk in the same department have pending proceedings in which they are being charged with accepting bribes to issue false nautical licences as well as forging documents of the Malta College for Arts, Science and Technology and defrauding the college, misappropriating funds, maliciously using false documents and committing a crime they were duty bound to prevent.