“My father has been in prison in Malta for around a year due to an unexplained harsh attitude taken by the country’s institutions. I ask the Italian government and the Strasbourg parliament to put an end to this incredible story,” Angela Caramazza told news agency agipronews.it.

Angela is the daughter of Gaetano, who was arrested in Malta on 8 December and charged with fraud, issuing fake cheques, joining others in planning to commit a crime, and money laundering.

The man is a gambling addict who for the past 30 years has visited the major gaming venues in Europe. Between November and December last year, he visited the Casino di Venezia in Malta where he lost EUR300,000 / Lm120,790. Being unable to pay the sum, he signed a cheque for EUR200,000 / Lm85,860 and asked the cashier to hold on to it till the week after when he would return to pay his dues in full. A fellow gamer undertook to pay the rest with a cheque, which later turned out to be stolen.

“When he returned to Malta,” Angela Caramazza said, “my father was arrested. Together with our lawyers we have found many irregularities in the way he was handled.”

He was granted bail for EUR37,000 / Lm15,884 but this was later withdrawn on the testimony of a taxi driver who claimed he wanted to abscond.

On 20 June, Rifondazione Communista senators Giuseppe Di Lello and Giovanni Russo Spena presented an urgent parliamentary question to the (Italian) Minister for Foreign Affairs, but so far he has not replied to them.