The two years and nine months sentence handed down to former Chief Justice Noel Arrigo last November, when he was found guilty of taking bribes, trading in influence and revealing state secrets was confirmed by the Appeals Court yesterday.

Dr Arrigo was also stripped of his rights – the right to vote and the right to hold public office among others – following a general interdiction.

The court, presided over by Mr Justice David Scicluna, Mr Justice Joseph Zammit Mc Keon and Mr Justice Noel Cuschieri said that there was nothing to indicate that the sentence should have been any different. When the decision was read out, Dr Arrigo’s shoulders slumped and he looked a beaten man. The sizeable gathering of relatives who accompanied him remained silent.

Speaking of the appeal to deduct the period Dr Arrigo had spent under house arrest, the court said that spending a period under house arrest did not automatically entitle the person to have that period reduced from the final sentence as the two were different matters.

Waiting for the Appeals’ Court verdict, Dr Arrigo listened to every word attentively, tightly clasping a rosary bead around his little finger. The Court ruled that in finding Dr Arrigo guilty, as well as in the sentence handed down, Mr Justice Giannino Caruana Demajo was right.

Dr Arrigo opted for a trial without a jury, when he faced charges that he had accepted a €23,293 bribe when, along with two other judges, he reduced the sentence of drug trafficker Mario Camilleri, also known as l-Imniehru, in July 2002.

The Court said that Dr Arrigo should have known that if someone approached him, he should inform the President of Malta about it, something which he failed to do. He also failed to return the envelope containing cash which Anthony Grech Sant threw on his desk.

The maximum term that the former Chief Justice might have been handed was four years and three months, while the minimum was nine months.

The prosecution was led by the head of the prosecution unit within the Attorney General’s Office, Anthony Barbara, together with Dr Lara Lanfranco. Lawyers Joseph Giglio, Robert Abela and Joseph Arrigo appeared for Dr Arrigo.