Men accused of murdering Daphne Caruana Galizia formally charged
Vince Muscat, George Degiorgio, and Alfred Degiorgio have been formally charged with the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, 21 months to the day since she was killed in a car-bomb near her home.
Attorney General Peter Grech filed the bill of indictment against the trio yesterday morning.
The compilation of evidence against the three has been ongoing since December 2017, when they were arrested in a raid in Marsa. The accused would have been eligible for release on bail early next month had they not been charged, as local law states that a bill of indictment must be served within 20 months of facing charges.
The accused had time and time again applied for bail, the most recent being Muscat’s attempt through a new lawyer last Monday.
Each time, however, the application for bail was thrown out.
The men will now stand trial for allegedly creating, planting, and detonating the bomb that killed the journalist on 16 October 2017.
The move comes in the wake of criticism that the Attorney General’s Office was taking long in issuing the bill of indictment and the recent Council of Europe report pressuring Malta to establish a public inquiry into the assassination.
While the three suspects have been charged, the mastermind behind the murder is still at large.
The Council of Europe has also, through a report it adopted late last month, instructed the Maltese government to call a public inquiry into the murder within the next three months.
The three men will now face a trial by jury, the date of which is still to be established.