Orders from above for Smith’s car to be removed from the scene before the magistrate/district police arrived

Published: November 22, 2014 at 10:07am

malta right now car removal

Malta Right Now and In-Nazzjon are running another big story today. They have confirmation that Morrison Smith’s car was removed from the scene before the district police and the duty magistrate arrived, and that the order to do so came directly from Police Commissioner Ray Zammit (the Police Minister’s cousin).

The intention seems also to have been to remove it before the press arrived, but the cameras got there as it was being lifted on the police force’s ‘low-loader’ and filmed and photographed the bullet holes in the back.

It was the police Rapid Intervention Unit which stopped the car, but they don’t do scene reports/documentation or interviews.

The questions that need to be addressed here are: was the car removed so that the police could remove evidence from it, so that they could remove something that was in it and that Manuel Mallia or his driver wanted, or so that the press wouldn’t see the bullet holes?

The news portal reports that it cannot discover whether the Police Commissioner was acting on higher orders still, or whether he used his own initiative.

I’d say he was acting on higher orders – or even let us say, lower orders, in the form of, for example, a chief of staff. Why else would he instantaneously think to remove Smith’s car?

The news portal also has confirmation from the police that backs up the eye-witness statements which it reported instantaneously that night and which were also reported on this website: that the shooting took place in Triq Wied Il-Kappara.

Malta Right Now also confirms that at some point between the shooting in Triq Wied Il-Kappara, when the car was still wearing its GM14 plates, and the time when reporters arrived at the scene in the tunnels, the GM plates had been removed and the routine-issue AQZ 853 plates were worn instead.

To hinder filming of even these routine-issue plates, the car boot was left open so that the rear plate was not visible to cameras, while the front of the car was angled away from journalists.




48 Comments Comment

  1. Beingpressed says:

    I’m assuming the car is still impounded?

    This is like when they acted to bury the Police Minister’s clients, drug dealers Mario Camilleri senior and junior, before forensic examinations had been carried out, with the result that the court had to order the exhumation of the corpses, which had already deteriorated considerably in the summer heat.

    • Tabatha White says:

      Bringing this information up again in this context immediately gives the incident a different perspective.

      Has there been a statement by Smith yet?

  2. Wilson says:

    So why is the GM car in front of Smith’s car? Are we sure the RIU stopped that car?

    Because the RIU was mentioned when they arrested the man further away from this place Msida?/ St. Venera tunnels? Not everything is out in the open.

  3. Noel says:

    What’s been said in that phone call at that very moment and to whom it was made will result crucial in establishing the series of events.

  4. curious says:

    This is important too.

    “Sorsi fil-qalba tal-Korp tal-Pulizija li tkellmu ma’ In-Nazzjon qalu wkoll li għandhom konferma li t-tiri fid-direzzjoni tal-Ingliż ġew sparati fit-triq residenzjali fl-inħawi tal-pixxina nazzjonali f’Tal-Qroqq fejn seħħ l-argument ma’ Sheehan.

    Jidher li l-eksxufier tal-Ministru Mallia fetaħ in-nar fuq il-karozza tas-sewwieq l-ieħor hekk kif dan ipprova jaħrab minnu malli ra l-arma f’idejh. Il-każ seħħ preċiżament fil-kantuniera bejn Treqjet Wied il-Kappara u Triq Edgar Bernard, li tiġi eżatt wara l-Kulleġġ Santa Monika.”

  5. Poor thing! says:

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141120/local/update-8-shooting-incident-ministerial-driver-suspended-from-all-duties.544812

    Meanwhile in fairy land: Minister about Sheehan

    “He said the officer involved in the past distinguished himself citing for example a case when he caught a hunter hunting illegally, despite being off duty. On another occasion, also while off duty, he helped put out a fire in a shop.”

    How sweet. Perhaps he expected him to walk past the shop fire and let it burn.

    • Angus Black says:

      I wonder how long it will take Joey to put Sheehan on the annual list of receivers of ‘Gieh ir-Repubblika’ medals?

  6. Someone says:

    Dear Daphne, you had commented negatively on my post that it was bizarre how quickly the car was taken away from tunnel. Maybe you will admit your initial statement was done “a caldo” which appears to be the in phrase for the week. :-)

    [Daphne – I did not comment negatively. I merely pointed out that it couldn’t be left there with traffic backed up behind it. That was because I take certain things like the rule of law for granted. I had assumed that the police officers crowding the scene were the district officers who had finished their scene report, and not just random ones from the Rapid Intervention Unit who are not empowered to draw up such reports.]

  7. Joe Fenech says:

    I hope that PL is happy with its PN rejects. This started off as “ara gew maghna” – reminiscent of village band rivalry.

    Here however, the setting is not a village feast but national/international politics and the consequences are very serious.

  8. doubting thomas says:

    We’re told there was an official function at Police Headquarters. So Manuel Mallia and the Police Commissioner would have been together when Paul Sheehan rang to say ‘We’ve got a problem.’

    • Jozef says:

      ‘..Malta Right Now also confirms that at some point between the shooting in Triq Wied Il-Kappara, when the car was still wearing its GM14 plates, and the time when reporters arrived at the scene in the tunnels, the GM plates had been removed and the routine-issue AQZ 853 plates were worn instead…’

      Net News has footage of the Mercedes from the right front showing the Z plates. Explains why that boot was open.

      The unedited picture of Sheehan is self explanatory, he’s next to the car, boot open, on his mobile, taking instructions.

      Let’s have those phone numbers.

  9. vitor says:

    The Minister for Home Affairs is a well established, experienced criminal lawyer. The Police Commissioner has many years of policing experience, rose through the ranks and ran a number of key police services over the years, and is tasked with ensuring the law is respected.

    If either of them breaks the law in this situation in the way they proceed, they do it with their eyes fully open, and they will have to answer for it in a Court of Law eventually if there is any rule of law in the country.

    They need to bear that in mind with every move they now make.

  10. Mike says:

    In one report on the times which I think was also carried here the Police Commissioner refused to divulge the Malta Police Guidelines for the Use of Firearms stating protection of state security as the reason for not giving this info.

    I found this on the NYPD’s website by doing a quick search:

    http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/analysis_and_planning/nypd_annual_firearms_discharge_report_2012.pdf

    Scroll down to page 8 – Guidelines for the use of Firearms.

  11. Osservatore says:

    This all stinks to high heaven and there is definitely so much more than meets the eye.

    It is all starting to sound very much like a drug deal gone wrong, the sort of stuff that we see in films and think will never happen here.

    Not that we are that naive – this has been going on for the last 35 years (and more) but has only recently been getting out of hand (between the gangs) as seen by various crimes that are suggestive of organised crime turf wars.

    There is indeed a criminal underworld that has always been protected by people in the know who have the power to turn a blind eye. Perhaps some of them even get to keep stashes of Euro notes under their mattresses for doing so.

  12. Panel beater says:

    Anyone seen the damage on Smith’s car? Driver side seems untouched. Not the damage by the bullets, but damaged caused when hitting the mirror of the minister’s car.

  13. ChrisM says:

    To hell with the lot of them! What more proof do we need that the Malta Labour Party are still a bunch of criminals and liars?

  14. doubting thomas says:

    This reasoning is so wrong. Are we to conclude that the DOI is less scrupulous in its work than the mainstream media?

    No press releases or other information should be issued without proper confirmation of the facts.

    Even so, why was the information they were getting from the site not the truth?

    “Government communications were relaying any information coming their way in real time, as the situation unfolded… it was what they were getting from the site, and could not be verified independently.’

    http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/budget_2015/46507/muscats_budget_forgotten_under_cloud_of_ministerial_responsibility

  15. Francis Saliba M.D. says:

    Abundant evidence that the “scene of the crime” was not being preserved intact until the arrival of the duty magistrate and that traces of the crime were being disturbed or at the very least not being preserved intact and uncontaminated as should have been done.

    This does not just an updated version of the Keystone Cops of Charlie Chaplin days. To me it stirs memories of a murder weapon, a submachine gun, being handled by the police before being planted in the farmhouse of an innocent Pietru Paul Busuttil

  16. Francis Saliba M.D. says:

    The opening sentence in the second paragraph of the previous comment should read:

    “This does not suggest an updated version …”

  17. Tabatha White says:

    How long did it take for the Rapid Intervention Unit to intervene, and who called them?

    It seems to me that they were on the scene far too rapidly.

    How long does it take a speeding car, the owner fleeing for his life, to get from Gzira to the tunnel in question?

  18. John B says:

    “was the car removed so that the police could remove evidence from it” or was the car removed so that something could be put in it?

    The fingerprints put on the scene of the crime in the Pietru Busuttil case come to mind.

  19. Has the Rubicon been crossed? says:

    Only the truth can set the force free of suspicion now.

    But is the truth so far off what we were told that it’s become too late for them to go there without heads rolling, including Muscat’s?

  20. Nistaqsi says:

    I cannot understand why all this security around Manuel Mallia, and the Prime Minister and his wife. What’s the reason ? Do we have a Prime Minister under threat ?

    I am told that, if someone takes a simple letter or Government internal mail to Manuel Mallia’s ministry in Valletta, they are kept for screening before they are passed to the Ministry.

    What’s happening ? Why all this fear ?

  21. ciccio says:

    The Commissioner is implying that the orders on the scene of the accident were being given by Supt. A. Mamo. Yes or No?

    If correct, then basically the Commissioner is suggesting that it was Supt. A. Mamo who gave the orders for the car to be loaded onto the low loader. Yes or No?

    Isn’t Supt. A. Mamo an experienced police officer? How on earth could he issue an order like that? If the Commissioner did not order him to move the car, because that would be wrong, why hasn’t the Commissioner sacked him already?

    But wait a moment. Did Supt. A. Mamo receive any orders from anyone else other than the Commissioner about that car and the low loader?

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141122/local/update-2-shooting-incident-acting-police-commissioner-should-give-clear-explanation-opposition-leader.545170

    Yet I am still baffled about why the Commissioner would have ordered a low loader in this case. Was this not just a car that had hit the mirror of another car and, at best, the driver tried to escape from the scene? Why did the Commissioner feel the need to have a low loader on site?

  22. P Shaw says:

    At this point, the police, who in the 80s planted false evidence inside the farm of Pietru Pawl Busuttil, look like amateurs by today’s crime standards.

    The police level of fabrication and screwing with the truth/evidence has increased exponentially during the last two years.

    The theories of a defence lawyer that were previously limited to a courtroom, are now being put in practice.

    This looks more and more like Russia where Putin cannot control the infighting between the oligarchs and their private militia.

  23. Mila says:

    Muscat said he will wait for the inquiry to be concluded. But, if it is true that the car was removed, the inquiry is useless because it will not be based on facts but on altered goal posts.

    Do we know who the senior officer on the scene was? He is the one who must either take responsibility for removing the vehicle or else say who gave him the order to do so.

    This whole case is the perfect example where not one single detail must be assumed or brushed aside. Take for example the haziness of where the car was parked, where Sheehan was and where the first contact occured. Does the version given make sense?

    The PM, because of all the pressure and media attention no doubt, certainly not because of his moral/ethical strength, is doing his utmost to minimize the damage to one fall guy, Sheehan. His strategy is to treat us like fools, hide the big picture and lul us into forgetting about the implications of every abuse and blunder that took place.

    We deserve better.

  24. Someone says:

    I’ve heard that local insurance companies will be excluding damage to claimants’ wing mirrors when caused by ministerial car wing mirrors, as it will be considered an Act of God.

  25. Alf says:

    As from 1st December 2014, it is obligatory to wear not only a seat belt but also a bullet proof vest.

    Various sizes from small to XL have been ordered and are being shipped. Unfortunately XXL sizes are out of stock.

    • H.P. Baxxter says:

      A bulletproof vest won’t protect you from a shot to the head. Or from being burnt alive in your home.

      I’m not being dramatic here. There is fear. We are living in fear.

      • Alf says:

        I know exactly what you mean. I do not have personal experience of being shot at but I have personally experienced the Labour mob (and the police) in the 70s and 80s

  26. doubting thomas says:

    Joseph Muscat has said that the government was issuing information in real time.

    One of the first details that was reported was that Smith was a Scott. How did they know? It was too short a time to go into such details. More questions than answers, I’m afraid.

  27. Jien says:

    Joseph Muscat is saying that Minister Mallia did not lie so much so that in his press conference, he corrected the first version that the shots were fired in the air.

    What the PN has to point out and insist on is the fact that during that conference, HE LIED AGAIN, as he said that security with previous ministers were always armed.

    Two ministers have denied this, and Manuel Mallia has not held a second press conference to retract that: YES, lying carries political responsibility.

  28. M says:

    Isn’t this just perfect?

    ”Although the vehicle was loaded on the low loader, he {Acting Commissioner Zammit} said, the police remained on site and the inquiry continued.” TOM

    Let me get this right, is he saying that the evidence was removed and the police, Sheehans buddies and work collegues no less, were conveniently giving their version of the evidence?

    Was Sheehan left on site to contribute his 2 cents worth for completness’ sake as well perhaps?

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141122/local/update-2-shooting-incident-acting-police-commissioner-should-give-clear-explanation-opposition-leader.545170

  29. Joe Micallef says:

    This whole cover-up just flies in the face of the touted Whistleblower Act.

  30. La Chouette says:

    This is a perfect example of injustice, where the innocent are made out to be the guilty. Why someone called the Rapid Response Unit to remove Mr. Smith’s car. In my opinion Mr.Manuel Mallia’s driver should have been arrested for such a crime and anyway why was he carrying a gun?

  31. Mim says:

    ”Update 2 – Shooting incident: Acting Police Commissioner should give clear explanation – Opposition leader.
    Commissioner denies giving order for car to be moved” TOM

    So all the Acting Commissioner could say was ‘mhux jien’.

    Does he realize that it is his job to find out who did?

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141122/local/update-2-shooting-incident-acting-police-commissioner-should-give-clear-explanation-opposition-leader.545170

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