Last Sunday Malta woke up to the grim news that a young Polish girl had been found murdered in Sliema.

The circumstances of the crime immediately gripped the attention of many, and the social media was taken by storm as everyone wanted to have a say on the matter, as usually happens.

There were some who immediately labelled it as a femicide, others described it as gender-based violence, but there were also thoughts that since the two – the aggressor and the victim – did not know each other, one could not really speak of a femicide.

As details began to be uncovered through articles on news websites, many were horrified by the scene described as the majority tried to piece the puzzle together. The information kept flowing, with the police later also giving more details on the murder, going as far as giving the name of the victim – Paulina Dembska (below) – in an official press statement.

It is quite uncommon for the police to name victims in their statements. In this case, the Police felt they had to, even because most media had already named the victim.

The perpetrator was also named, not officially by the Police. Abner Aquilina (below), aged 20, was for a time held by the Police for questioning until he was referred to Mount Carmel Hospital for treatment. Until he is released, the Police can investigate other avenues related to the murder but cannot continue their questioning.

More fuel was added to the fire of the “femicide or not” debate when, soon after the murder, the Women’s Rights Foundation said that Dembska, the first murdered victim of 2022, “suffered one of the most brutal forms of gender-based violence against women. We are adding her name to the long list of names of women whose life was cut short because of misogyny and relentless male violence caused by it”.

The Malta Independent on Sunday spoke to Marceline Naudi, a senior lecturer at the University of Malta’s Faculty for Social Wellbeing and governor at the Woman’s Rights Foundation, to get her views on the subject.

When it comes to femicide, she said in written answers via email, such murder classification does not depend on the level of familiarity the victim has with the murderer.

“However, the most common form of femicide is that of intimate partner femicide and (killing by) family members – but it includes killing a woman because she is a woman, so stranger rape and assault are forms of VAW (violence against women) and if they result in death then of femicide,” she added.

“Femicide is part of the continuum that is VAW – in all, the continuum includes sexual harassment on the street, on public transport, online, at work, it includes intimate partner violence and family violence, stranger rape and assault, etc., ending in the most severe form, that of femicide.”

Naudi said that Police need to do more than what they are doing in this regard.

“There is a lot more that journalists can do, the courts and justice system, and a lot more that the 'man' in the street can do! This is something which we all need to take seriously and work to create a change in the mentality that says it's okay to harass, to insist, to pressure, etc. a woman and she's a dejqa if she objects – we are not allowed ownership of our bodies, our selves – we all need to work at this!”

In the recent report Country Report on Femicide Research and Data: Malta, published by the Women’s Rights Foundation, various legislative recommendations were listed.

These include the introduction of femicide as a criminal offence and alternatively ensure that femicide constitutes an aggravation to the offence of homicide. Such a call, however, has many detractors as murder should always carry the maximum punishment, whether it is a man or a woman who is killed.

Speaking to TVM a few days ago, lawyer Veronique Dalli said: “Laws for homicide, which in this case is a femicide, already exist and I don’t think there can be stricter penalty than life imprisonment.”

Other recommendations put forward by the foundation are that the investigation, prosecution and punishment of such cases need to be carried out with a gendered lens:

·         Ensuring that all forms of protection orders are accessible and available, including at civil law for women, irrespective of or in addition to other legal proceedings and stepping up efforts to monitor and enforce protection orders, including through protocols/regulation and technical means such as electronic tagging;

·         Introduce the use of GPS monitoring on perpetrators that have been released on bail and are waiting to be taken to court, as well as in those cases where a suspended sentence has been awarded and restraining orders have been issued so as to ensure that the risk of femicide is reduced.

 

List of femicides in the last 40 years

 

2022:   29-year old Paulina Dembska was killed in Sliema. A passer-by discovered the Polish student’s body at 6.30am in Independence Gardens in Sliema. A suspect, Abner Aquilina, was held for questioning but interrogation was suspended as he was referred to Mount Carmel Hospital for treatment.

2020:   Mother of two, Chantelle Chetcuti, was stabbed outside a Żabbar club. Justin Borg, the father of both children, was charged with the crime. He is on bail.

2019: 70-year-old Maria Lourdes and 29-year-old Angele Bonnici, a mother and her daughter, were found dead with their corpses partially covered in a field off Gudja. Thirty-eight-year-old Joseph Bonnici was later charged with killing his mother and sister.

2018:   74-year-old Maria Carmela Fenech and 71-year-old Antonia Micallef were stabbed to death in their Gharghur residence. Kevin Micallef, 42, stands accused of killing his mother and aunt after stabbing them to death with a butcher knife, following an argument that erupted after Micallef suspected that the women were putting tranquilisers drugs in his coffee. Proceedings continue.

2018:   Dutchwoman Shannon Mak, 23, was found beaten and with a slashed throat in Santa Venera. Her body was found between a wall and a parked car. Her former boyfriend, Jelle Rijpma, was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

2018:   35-year-old Lourdes Agius, a mother of seven, was found dead in her Paola residence by her mother. She was killed by strangulation. Agius' partner at the time was 28-year-old Michael Emmanuel from the Ivory Coast. He was later charged with her murder.

2016:   33-year-old Eleanor Mangion was found murdered in a warehouse in Hal-Qormi. Her estranged husband Andrew Mangion, who is also the father of their nine-year-old daughter, was accused of murdering her.

2016:   41-year old Caroline Magri was found lifeless on her bed after her throat was slashed in Ta' Giorni. Before her death, she had sought police help to go after her partner Djibril Ganiou, as he was threatening her. He was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment.

2015:   36-year-old Silvana Muscat was found lifeless on her bed in St Paul's Bay after being stabbed five times. The main suspect was her husband, Hamid Nour Eddine G. Ibraham. The victim had filed many police reports against him. He is one of Europe's most wanted escapees.

2012:   38-year-old mother of five Yvette Gajda was stabbed to death with a pair of scissors used as a knife in her neck, shoulders and head in their St Paul's Bay residence. During the autopsy, it was revealed that she was stabbed 60 times. Fifty-seven-year-old Laszlo Nandor Marton was jailed for 25 years after pleading guilty.

2012:   31-year old lawyer Margaret Mifsud was found strangled in her car in Bahar ic-Caghaq. Her ex-husband, Nizar El Gadi  was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.

2012:   40-year old Meryem Bugeja, who was five months pregnant with twins at the time, was found dead with head wounds in her home in Mgarr. Her murder is still unsolved.

2011:   38-year-old Bulgarian Irena Abadzhieva was found dead in an apartment she rented in Bugibba. She had been stabbed 40 times when her body was discovered after neighbours started complaining about a smell. The murder is still unsolved.

2011:   54-year-old Karen Cheatle was found drowned in her Mellieha flat. She had relocated to Malta after divorcing in 2004. Around the time she was found dead, she was dating 52-year-old John Agius. The police hold the belief that he murdered her at her flat before committing suicide.

2010:   40-year-old mother Christine Sammut was shot to death in Mgarr. Kenneth Gafa', her former partner, was later sentenced to 35 years imprisonment.

2009: 40-year old Catherine Agius was stabbed to death as she was getting off public transportation on her stop in Tarxien. Her ex-husband, Roger Agius was sentenced to 31 years in jail.

2009:   35-year old Lyudmila Nykytiuk, who was Ukrainian, fell down a shaft after arguing with her husband in St Paul's Bay. Sergei Nykytiuk was later sentenced to 25 years in prison.

2005:   Doris Schembri, 61, a then hospital patient at St Luke's Hospital, was stabbed to death with a pair of scissors. Anthony Schembri had pleaded insanity but jurors returned a verdict that he was of sound mind when the crime was committed.

2004:   55-year-old Patricia Attard, who worked as a driver in her family's business, was found shot dead in a car at Ta' Qali.

2003:   32-year-old Josette Scicluna was found dead at her residence in San Gwann. She had been stabbed 49 times. Her partner, David Norbert Schembri, was later sentenced to life in prison.

2002:  38-year-old Pauline Tanti was stabbed to death in Rabat. Her husband then hanged himself in the marital home.

2002:   20-year-old Rachel Muscat was found stabbed to death in a flat located in Bir id-Deheb. Walid Bazena, 23, filed a guilty plea and was jailed for 25 years.

2001:   22-year-old mother Vanessa Grech and her 17-month-old daughter Ailey were both stabbed to death in a Birzebbuga flat. Alfred Azzopardi, 47, of Zejtun, was jailed for life.

1999:   Jane Vella was last seen at Tas-Sanap Cliffs in 1999 in Gozo. Her husband Ronnie Vella was sentenced to 30 years in jail. Her body was never recovered.

1993:  36-year-old Sylvia King was found burnt alive in a car in the limits of Rabat after being abducted near Sant'Antnin plant. Joseph Harrington, the man found guilty of the shocking murder, was jailed for life.

1993:   32-year-old mother of four, Diane Gerada, was found stabbed to death by her husband at the couple's home in Marsaxlokk. The court ruled that her husband, Grazio Gerada, had acted under provocation. He was jailed for four years.

1981:   Rose Casaletto was found dead in a bathtub. Her husband Francis Casaletto was found guilty of the crime.