Well-known property developer Charles Polidano has had a €100,000 fine for cutting down a protected tree and demolishing a rubble wall reduced to €10,000 on appeal.

Polidano was found to have cut down at least one 50-year-old Bay Laurel tree which is highly protected under Maltese law.

It was claimed that Polidano ignored an emergency conservation order issued by then MEPA in July 2011. At this stage, he had already cut down the protected tree, while in the meantime his application for the construction of 43 apartments, restoration of two old dwellings and an underground car park for 121 cars had been rejected in 2009 by the MEPA board.

Subsequently, a 2013 court found Polidano guilty of breaching the environmental protection and planning laws, fining him €100,000.
Defence lawyers Michael and Lucio Sciriha, representing the accused, appealed this sentence. In the court application, it was argued that all proceedings should be declared null because a private lawyer had conducted the prosecution when he had no official role. It was also argued that the onus of proof had been placed on the accused rather than the prosecution as is standard. Polidano observed that the prosecution did not bring forward sufficient evidence and that it was expecting him to prove his innocence instead of the other way around.

The appellants lawyers stressed that no evidence of wrongdoing had been presented by the prosecution, where the latter also failed to discover the names of the workers who had stopped at the scene. It was also observed that the same workers had not been called to testify in these proceedings to confirm who they were employed by.

Mr Justice David Scicluna, presiding over the case, partially upheld the appeal. Scicluna, when analyzing the punishment of the first court, found that it was only proven that one protected tree had been cut down.

The court declared it could not ignore that while the appeal was being heard, full development permission was granted over the Balzan sight, where it was to be preserved as a green enclave embellished with trees and the building of a new rubble wall. The court also observed that the permit was granted for the same property but to another company of Polidano.

In its final remarks, the court found that despite a pending appeal on the issuing of the aforementioned permit, the very fact that it was issues in the first place showed how authorities had achieved their aim in scheduling the properties concerned, and this allowed room for altering the punishment.

The hefty fine was revoked to €10,000, Polidano was ordered to bring himself in line with the emergency conservation order, where until he does he must pay a €130 daily fine.