Malta court acquits Yorgen Fenech over journalist Caruana Galizia murder plot
A Malta jury acquitted businessman Yorgen Fenech of masterminding the 2017 murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. The family condemned the verdict, citing ongoing institutional failures.
Fenech cleared of plotting murder of Malta's anti-corruption journalist
A court in Valletta has acquitted businessman Yorgen Fenech, 44, of all charges relating to the murder of prominent anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, Google News IE — Crime (en) reports, citing Al Jazeera.
The jury delivered its verdict on Wednesday following eight hours of deliberation, clearing Fenech by an 8–1 margin on both the charge of complicity to murder and the lesser charge of criminal association to commit murder. Had he been convicted, Fenech faced life in prison.
Caruana Galizia's family wept in the packed courtroom after the verdict was announced. In a statement, they said: "Nine years after Daphne's brutal assassination, the institutional failures that enabled her murder remain unaddressed and unreformed. Lasting justice means no person should ever face the same risks again. Our country failed to protect Daphne's life. It owes it to her to prevent other lives being lost."
Members of Fenech's family were seen celebrating the jury's decision.
Prosecutors had argued that Fenech wanted Caruana Galizia dead because she was on the verge of exposing information about him. His defence, however, pointed to Fenech's former associate Keith Schembri — the one-time chief of staff to then–Prime Minister Joseph Muscat — as the figure behind the killing. Schembri was a recurring target of Caruana Galizia's reporting and has denied any role in the murder. Police told the court he had never been considered a suspect.
Muscat, who was not linked to the assassination, resigned in January 2020 amid the political turmoil that followed the killing.
Caruana Galizia was killed by a car bomb in October 2017. Known as a "one-woman WikiLeaks", she had spent years exposing corruption linking Malta's business and political elites. She was 53 at the time of her death. The assassination sent shockwaves through Europe's journalism community and drew intense international scrutiny to Malta's police force and judiciary.
A 2021 independent inquiry concluded that Maltese officials had failed to protect Caruana Galizia from threats to her life prior to her murder.
Source: Google News IE — Crime (en)