A lot is said about the length of time a court case takes in order to be decided, but it is rare that we can see the real absurdity of the situation before our very eyes.

However, the case of Bernice Cilia has given us that opportunity - and it is a stark realisation of the severe impact that delayed justice may have on the intrinsic safety of an individual.

Bernice Cilia was murdered by her husband Roderick Cassar on the morning of 22 November 2022.  Cassar stalked Cilia and followed her to Corradino where he got out of his car and shot her twice with a shotgun.

Cilia had long been frightened that her husband would kill her and she filed a report with the Police's Domestic Violence Unit six months prior to the day that her fears became a reality. On that occasion - Mother's Day - Cassar held a knife to her throat.  In July 2022, while they were living separately, Cassar threatened to kill Cilia and "blow [her] brains out."

The evening before her murder, Cilia reported her husband to the police for threats he had made against her.

Cassar was arrested for the murder, and he eventually pled guilty to all charges on 5 November 2025 - a few weeks short of the three year anniversary of the brutal murder.  He was sentenced to 40 years in prison under the terms of a plea agreement reached with prosecutors.

The guilty plea came around a month before Cassar was scheduled to face a trial by jury, the final step in the judicial process of a case.

Now, 8 months later and a shocking three years and seven months after Cilia was murdered, the courts have ruled on the domestic violence cases based on the reports that Cilia herself had filed before she was murdered.

Cassar was handed a three-month jail sentence for the Mother's Day knife incident, and another eight-month sentence for his threats against Cilia in July 2022.

This whole process is a stark exposure of the dangers and challenges that domestic violence victims face. 

Not only was justice for Bernice Cilia not achieved in a manner timely enough for her to be protected from her aggressor - justice only came after Cilia had been killed by the said aggressor, and after the said aggressor was set to face trial for that murder.

It is beyond belief that these two domestic violence cases only came up for an outcome some four years after the incidents took place.  It is absurd that the whole process leading to a murder trial actually took less time.  It is a total failure of the justice system to protect those who need to be protected.

"Justice delayed is justice denied. In Bernice [Cassar] Cilia's case, justice was not merely delayed. It came too late to protect her life," the Malta Women's Lobby said in a reaction to the news.

"The fact that a woman who reported serious threats, including being threatened with death and subjected to a knife attack, sees justice delivered only after she has been killed is a devastating indictment of the system," it added.

There is no better, more succinct way of explaining the situation.

The sentences delivered this week will offer scant consolation. If anything, they serve as a reminder not of the judicial consequences of domestic violence, but of how dangerous it is when cases like these do not have a swift and decisive reaction.

Anything less than that places the victim at risk. The Women's Lobby summed it up: "Bernice Cilia did what women are repeatedly told to do. She reported. She sought help. She relied on the authorities to protect her. Yet the system failed her."

We, as a country, cannot have or accept a system that fails anyone else.