Nearly nine years after the assassination of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, the prosecution on Thursday presented jurors with its detailed account of why it believes businessman Yorgen Fenech should be found guilty of complicity in her murder, outlining the alleged planning of the assassination, the role of middleman Melvin Theuma, and the evidence it says will establish the accused's guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Addressing the jury on the second day of the trial, prosecutor Anthony Vella stressed that Fenech is presumed innocent and that the burden of proof rests entirely with the prosecution.

Vella also made clear that the prosecution believes the evidence will show that Fenech commissioned and financed the assassination of Caruana Galizia, even though he was not physically present when the bomb that killed the journalist exploded outside her Bidnija home on 16 October 2017.

Reconstructing the events leading to Caruana Galizia's assassination, the prosecution said Fenech instructed Melvin Theuma in April 2017 to arrange the killing of the journalist, a columnist for The Malta Independent, in order to prevent the publication of information concerning his uncle.

The prosecution said Theuma, who has since been granted a presidential pardon and is expected to testify during the trial, approached Alfred Degiorgio after initially failing to contact George Degiorgio directly. The prosecutor told jurors that Alfred Degiorgio wanted assurance that the client would pay before discussing any details.

Following discussions with his associates, the prosecution said Alfred Degiorgio quoted a price of €150,000 for the assassination. The payment was structured as a €30,000 non-refundable deposit and a further €120,000 after the murder had been carried out.

Vella said the proposed price and payment structure were subsequently approved by Fenech.

The prosecution told the court that the conspiracy was temporarily interrupted when the 2017 general election was called, but resumed shortly afterwards.

According to Vella, after the election Fenech met Theuma again and handed over the deposit.

The prosecutor said that as Caruana Galizia continued publishing stories, Fenech became increasingly anxious that she would reveal information damaging to him and urged Theuma to ensure that the assassination was carried out before further reports appeared.

Burner phones and surveillance

Vella then described how, according to the prosecution, the three men tasked with carrying out the killing decided that a car bomb would be used.

To minimise the risk of detection, burner mobile phones and SIM cards without internet connectivity were purchased, while surveillance of Caruana Galizia's movements intensified in the weeks leading up to the attack.

Jurors heard that the men spent considerable time monitoring the area around the journalist's Bidnija residence in order to establish her daily routine and identify the best opportunity to carry out the assassination.

Vella then outlined the prosecution's version of how the murder itself unfolded.

According to the prosecution, during the night between 15 and 16 October 2017, a bomb was attached beneath the driver's seat of Caruana Galizia's Peugeot 108.

The device, jurors heard, was designed to be detonated remotely by means of a coded text message.

The prosecutor said that on the afternoon of 16 October, after Caruana Galizia left home to drive to a bank appointment, Alfred Degiorgio and Vince Muscat signalled to George Degiorgio, who was waiting aboard the fishing vessel Maya outside the Grand Harbour. A text message detonated the explosive device, killing the journalist.

The prosecution told the court that approximately €400,000 was paid to finance the legal defence of Alfred and George Degiorgio when they were arrested.

A wife, a mother and a sister

Vella reminded jurors that Caruana Galizia was "a wife, a mother and a sister" whose death devastated her family.

He also referred to her profession, telling jurors that regardless of whether people agreed with what she wrote, they should remember that she had been killed because of her journalistic work.

The prosecutor then explained that criminal liability requires proof of two essential elements: the guilty state of mind, known in law as mens rea, and the physical act constituting the offence, or actus reus.

Both, he stressed, must be established before a guilty verdict can be returned.

Vella devoted considerable time to explaining the concept of criminal intent, distinguishing between deliberate homicide and accidental death.

Using the example of a driver who accidentally strikes a pedestrian while reversing a vehicle, he explained that negligence alone would not amount to the level of intent required for wilful homicide.

By contrast, he argued, where someone commissions another person to carry out a killing, the necessary criminal intention remains present because the person ordering the crime deliberately intends that another person's life be placed in manifest jeopardy.

The prosecutor told jurors that they would ultimately have to determine whether, according to the evidence presented, Fenech intended either to cause Caruana Galizia's death directly or knowingly place her life in manifest danger.

Complicity

Vella then turned to the charge of complicity, telling jurors that criminal responsibility for homicide is not confined to the individual who physically carries out the act.

The law, he explained, places the person who commissions a murder on the same footing as those who execute it.

Although Fenech was not present in Bidnija when the bomb exploded, the prosecution's case is that he was the individual who set the plan in motion, financed it and coordinated it from behind the scenes.

"Without Yorgen Fenech's role, Daphne Caruana Galizia would not have been killed," Vella told the jury, explaining that this was why the accused was facing trial as an accomplice to wilful homicide.

The prosecutor then provided jurors with what he described as a "checklist" of questions they would eventually need to answer before reaching a verdict.

Among them were whether Fenech acted as a complicit party, whether he intended to kill Caruana Galizia or knowingly place her life in manifest jeopardy, whether the killing formed part of an arrangement that he financed and approved, and whether the homicide was carried out without any legal justification.

If, after considering all the evidence, jurors were satisfied that each of these elements had been proven, they could, "with the greatest serenity", return a guilty verdict, Vella said.

Legal requirements

The prosecutor outlined the legal requirements for establishing complicity, telling jurors they would need to determine whether there had been an agreement between two or more people to commit the offence, whether that agreement related to a serious crime punishable by imprisonment, and whether each participant understood and carried out his role within the plan.

He cautioned jurors against thinking of an agreement as a formal written contract.

Instead, he said, agreements of this nature are ordinarily established by piecing together various pieces of evidence and drawing reasonable inferences from the conduct of those involved.

Vella also reminded the jury that the proceedings concern only one accused.

"The case before you is Repubblika ta' Malta versus Yorgen Fenech," he said, stressing that while other individuals feature in the prosecution's narrative, it is Fenech's criminal responsibility alone that the jury must determine.

Audio recordings

A substantial part of the prosecution's address focused on audio recordings secretly made by Melvin Theuma, which Vella described as an important part of the evidence the jury will hear during the trial.

The recordings, he reminded jurors, had been hidden by Theuma inside a Smiles ice cream box before eventually being handed over to investigators.

According to the prosecutor, those recordings captured conversations between Theuma and Fenech discussing Caruana Galizia's murder over several hours.

Vella described Theuma's decision to secretly record the conversations as fortunate "for justice and for the truth".

The prosecutor referred to a number of exchanges that the jury is expected to hear during the proceedings.

In one conversation, he said, Fenech allegedly remarked that "a person like her I'd throw down from here", referring to Caruana Galizia while both men were in Portomaso.

The prosecutor also referred to another recorded discussion concerning payments allegedly made to the Degiorgio brothers.

According to Vella, Fenech is heard saying: "What they asked for, I gave it to them... when he said he wanted another five thousand, I gave it as well."

The prosecutor stressed that these represented only a small sample of the recordings that jurors will hear during the trial.

Returning to Theuma's role, Vella sought to explain why the middleman had begun secretly recording his conversations.

He told jurors that after the arrest of the Degiorgio brothers, Theuma became increasingly fearful that he could either be killed or prosecuted himself because he represented what the prosecution described as the crucial link.

The prosecutor said Theuma began acting out of fear rather than self-interest.

Approaching the evidence

Vella devoted a significant part of his address to explaining how jurors should approach the evidence they will hear over the coming weeks.

He reminded them that the courtroom is "the court of proof" and stressed that they must completely disregard anything they may previously have read, heard or discussed outside the proceedings.

Their verdict, he said, must rest exclusively on the evidence presented before them, free from sympathy, prejudice or outside influence.

The law, he said, requires proof beyond reasonable doubt - not absolute certainty.

The prosecutor also explained the distinction between direct and circumstantial evidence, telling jurors that not every criminal case contains direct proof of guilt.

Circumstantial evidence, he said, consists of a chain of facts which, when viewed together, point towards a single logical conclusion.

He compared it to seeing people entering a building wearing wet raincoats and carrying dripping umbrellas, allowing one reasonably to conclude that it had been raining outside despite never witnessing the rain itself.

Vella urged jurors to carefully observe not only what witnesses say but also how they give their evidence, encouraging them to assess each witness's credibility, demeanour and possible interest in the outcome of the case.

He told them that from Friday the trial would move into the evidential stage, with police investigators expected to testify first, followed by forensic experts, medical professionals and specialists from Europol, the FBI and the Netherlands Forensic Institute.

"This is when the evidence begins," he said.

Bringing his address to a close after several hours, Vella reminded jurors that justice requires fairness both to victims and to accused persons.

"It is a great failure if an innocent person is found guilty," he said.

"But it is an equally great failure if a person who committed such a serious crime is not brought to justice."

The trial continues on Friday, when proceedings move from opening addresses to the presentation of evidence, beginning with testimony from police officers and investigators involved in the case.

For a minute-by-minute account of the proceedings, click here