Columnist Daphne Caruana Galizia was yesterday acquitted of charges of harassment, when the court ruled that a journalist writing about a public person does not amount to harassment. Charges of defamation and criminal libel were dropped.
Earlier this week, Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera decided to withdraw her criminal libel and defamation proceedings against Mrs Caruana Galizia, which she put down to the retraction of certain allegations related to drugs and corruption.
The charge of harassment is an ex ufficio charge, which cannot be dropped at the Magistrate’s request, but yesterday morning Mrs Caruana Galizia was acquitted of harassing Magistrate Scerri Herrera since a journalist writing about, even if criticising, a public figure does not amount to harassment.
The court, presided by Magistrate Antonio Micallef Trigona, was told that the magistrate was no longer interested in pursuing the case. Mrs Caruana Galizia’s lawyer, Roberto Montalto, said his client accepted Magistrate Scerri Herrera’s decision to stop proceedings against her.
Last Wednesday, Magistrate Scerri Herrera said that her proceedings had been instigated principally based on drug-related defamatory comments and comments implying corruption, and she was stopping proceedings now that the allegations had been retracted.
Magistrate Scerri Herrera also said that she had decided to drop the charges because Mrs Caruana Galizia had admitted in court that she had not verified facts, before writing her blog.
Both claims were rebutted by Mrs Caruana Galizia, who categorically denied that she had done anything of the sort. She insisted that, rather, she had gone on to elaborate in further detail in court and denied that she had not verified the facts.
Mrs Caruana Galizia said that the Magistrate only decided to stop the case once she had seen the list of witnesses who would be brought to testify. The list included former Chief Justice Vincent de Gaetano, Opposition leader Joseph Muscat, Nationalist MP Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando and PN candidate Robert Musumeci.
Deputy police commissioner Michael Cassar, former PL general secretary Jason Micallef, lawyer Veronique Dalli and Ronnie Pellegrini were also to be called as witnesses.
The court registrar was also going to be called, to tell the Court how many libel cases had been removed from Magistrate Scerri Herrera’s authority and how many times Mr Musumeci had been appointed court expert by Magistrate Scerri Herrera, and the dates of these cases.