Top comment (11)

Published: November 23, 2014 at 12:02am

Posted by H. P. Baxxter in reference to the prime minister’s letter to the Opposition leader:

How unbelievably stupid and ignorant. We’re talking ignorance of the basic functioning of our constitution, our laws, our republic and everything else here.

A crime has been committed. The police must prosecute. End of story. This was never about parliamentary politics, so the Leader of the Opposition’s involvement in the whole affair should be zero.

The Prime Minister’s involvement in the Police prosecution should also be zero. However, he is and should be fully involved in one aspect of the story: the sacking of his minister’s driver, followed by the sacking of the minister himself, whose position is untenable.

At no point does Simon Busuttil feature in the chain of events. But I fully expect most of my countrymen not to give a f*ck about the separation of powers and the proper functioning of the Republic and other such niceties, hux, kif qazzistna Baxxter hsiebek biex tikkritika.

I mean what magisterial enquiry, for f*ck’s sake?

If I were to throw an eppie-scoppie right now, and go out into the street and fire off a pistol, would there be a magis-bloody-terial inquiry? No. Hell, no there wouldn’t. There would be a prosecution. (After a good kicking in of my head by the police officers on the scene, but that’s by the by).

More lawyers per head than anywhere else on Earth and we still get this wrong.




17 Comments Comment

  1. Pablo says:

    Do we need four members of the judiciary to get our Police Commissioner to arrest Sheehan and charge him with attempted murder and the related of fences? Who is protecting this gun happy cop?

  2. Wilson says:

    Nice of you to explain it because a few days later no one seems to be getting the low down of this story.

  3. curious says:

    Isn’t this a bit of a give away? Is it usual to emphasise ‘or any other official’?

    ‘The board will be tasked with seeing whether Minister Mallia or any other official interfered in the case.’

  4. ken il malti says:

    The problem is that Malta does not have a government in the traditional Northern European sense.

    It is two gangs fighting it out on who gets to control the city (ie Malta) and its piggy-bank, so the winning side can pilfer it.

    Rules and laws are for others, so anything goes.

  5. curious says:

    If the indications that are being given point to a second person in the car, whose to say who is the owner of the firearm?

    We are all wondering why Sheehan was not arrested. Was he acting on the other person’s instructions? He may be willing to do his masters a favour and be the fall guy but not to the extent of going to prison.

    • H.P. Baxxter says:

      Don’t get me started. I have maybe half a dozen questions that, if answered, would clear up every last mystery in this affair.

      1. What weapon was it? (then we’d know if it’s standard police issue or not)
      2. How many rounds were fired? (then we’d know how the shooter behaved)
      3. Why did the car have its official number plate when it was not on official business? (then we’d know what Sheehan was doing there)
      4. Was the weapon holstered or not? (Sheehan appears to have been shirtsleeves, without a jacket. If not holstered, the weapon was concealed in the car, and if it’s concealed, it’s carried to react to a threat, not as a deterrent. Ditto if carried in a concealed holster.)
      5. Why did Sheehan judge a clipped wing mirror to be a threat requiring the use of his firearm?
      6. So is there a specific threat to Manuel Mallia’s life?

      Etc.

      But of course you’d need a smart prosecuting lawyer to ask any of this, and a trial, and a prosecution. Without a prosecution, we’ll never get the truth. Move along, Malta. Nothing to see here.

  6. Denis says:

    How true and precise on every post you are, Mr. Baxxter.

  7. jaqq says:

    The problem is that under this government everyone is scared and terrorised to speak. Only God knows what would have happened had it been under PN government.

    Secondly, now we will see if Xarabank will dedicate a programme to this issue. Recently because George Pullicino was attacked in Parliament for an alleged wrong-doing he was called on Xarabank to justify himself and be the sacrificial lamb.

  8. Justitia says:

    Chapeau.

    This issue is indeed no question of parlamentiary politics except for the fact that it reflects rather clearly that Dr. Muscat has undergone political orchiectomy.

    The issue is in its “purity” nothing less than a criminal event, which does not call for any political investigation, be it through the office of a magistrate, be it through three judges.

    The police officer in question must be dismissed from his post(s) and prosecuted in alignment with the legal codex of Malta.

    The person, i.e. the Minister, who hand-picked the police officer, must assume political responsibility and resign from his high office.

  9. Joan Rivers says:

    It looks as though Joseph Muscat is buying time for himself.

    Does he have a replacement for Manuel Mallia? Mallia was crap from the start.

    Maybe Muscat got the hint he might need to take over Mallia’s portfolio? He must be petrified.

    This mess is all a karma comeback for Muscat, but what do you expect?

  10. Brimbu says:

    It’s worrying that this is clearly not a case of incompetence or ignorance, but a well-planned scheme to arrive at the desired conclusion.

    The truth is way back in the priority list.

    I am not sure that the shooting was the worst thing that happened, as the follow up is worse, and is an indication of what will happen in the future.

    The PM and the Police are there to serve the Maltese people and not the selected close few.

  11. May Cassar says:

    This all boils down to ‘Two weights; two measures’.

    A few weeks back a man was protesting with a wooden make-believe gun and was arrested.

    Now a man fires live ammunition at another person and the victim is arrested.

    Malta is becoming a scary place to live. Law and order and justice have all been swept under the carpet.

  12. Pippa says:

    But we are very proud of the number of students at our university.

    Now we’ve got a lot of people with half the alphabet behind their names but do we have real professionals?

    And especially in this case – unless Baxxter is a lawyer – do we have lawyers who are real men and women ready to stand up to this regime and speak up and counteract to defend our liberty and our rights?

    If you lead many will follow (hopefully).

  13. C Falzon says:

    I think the whole magisterial inquiry thing is just to deflect attention away from Paul Sheenan himself to gain enough time for the evidence to become stale.

    The magisterial inquiry into whether the minister interfered is something that perhaps should be done as well, but it makes no sense unless Sheehan is already in court facing charges of attempted murder and the numerous other charges he is meant to face, such as endangering life and limb by shooting in a residential street and by dangerous driving.

    More important and urgent than that inquiry there should have been an urgent police investigation into the crime itself. If anything, without that the whole inquiry about the minister’s involvement will have nothing to rest on.

    One interesting thing is that there seems to have been no investigation of the crime scene; at least I haven’t seen anything in the media.

    It has been made to appear that the crime scene was the tunnel rather than where Smith was (first?) shot at. The Leader of the Opposition has drawn attention to this fact by holding a press conference yesterday afternoon at the very site of the actual shooting, in Triq Wied Il-Kappara.

    There has been no mention of the spent cartridges – how many there were and where they were. That is one of the cardinal things that is sought in any firearm crime.

    At least two of them should have been found at Gzira where at least two shots were fired.

    Where was the third shot fired?

    Was it by any chance shot from the moving car, further endangering the public? Were more than three shots fired?

    We only know of two that were heard at Gzira and that three were lodged in the car but are we sure that every shot fired hit the car?

    What if others were shot, where are they?

    Why was the minister’s car not searched and examined, especially for spent cartridges and gunshot residue?

    [Daphne – Don’t you think that’s exactly why they magicked the minister’s car away, to remove the spent cartridges and gunshot residue?]

    • C Falzon says:

      Precisely – it should have been put on the low loader just like Smith’s car and taken to a (supposedly) secure location for detailed forensic investigation. And in both cases this should have been preceded by a proper on site forensic documentation of evidence, photographic and otherwise.

      It seems to me that the only reliable evidence collected was by journalists and not the police.

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