Daphne taghti fastidju lil Charlon Gouder No. 5

From the archives: JASON, RONNIE AND CHARLON RUSH TO COURT TO ROOT FOR THE MAGISTRATE

One of the things I wrote about Magistrate Consuelo Herrera is that she repeatedly, regularly and blatantly breaches the code of ethics for the judiciary by consorting with Labour politicians and Super One personnel and conducting intimate friendships with them.

So you would think that the people at Super One might have the good sense to back off and stop being so bloody obvious about their passionate friendship with the magistrate. After all, even chickens have brains.

But no. This morning while waiting for my lawyer I popped into Cafe Cordina for an espresso at the bar. There they were, lined up with their own coffees opposite me: the magistrate’s brother and Labour MP Jose Herrera, Super One chairman Jason Micallef and his ‘friend’ and former Lorry Sant henchman, Ronnie Pellegrini. Jason and Ronnie were all dressed up for court in pale ‘sjuts’ and even paler ties, like poster boys for LGBT Labour.

Meanwhile, an entire news crew from Super One – cameraman, photographer, reporters – camped out outside the law courts for almost three hours, waiting for me to enter and then waiting for me to exit. You’d think Noel Arrigo was being taken up on a bribery charge.

In court, the magistrate declared that he would have no circus with people standing around the room, and that all those who couldn’t find a seat would have to leave. Jason squeezed onto a bench (hip to hip with one of my sisters, much to her disgust) and proceeded to send urgent text messages to HQ.

Charlon sat on the bench reserved for the press. U Ronnie baqa barra ghax ma lahaqx post, and found himself following proceedings with his nose pressed up against that little window in the door.

Then it occurred to me that neither Jason nor Charlon should be in the room, because I plan to call them up as witnesses. I told my lawyer, who told the magistrate, who told them to leave.

But Charlon and Jason weren’t taking any of that. Oh no. Charlon protested that he hadn’t been notified that he was a witness (like that has anything to do with the price of eggs), and Jason actually challenged the magistrate and demanded an explanation. He got it. They left. The pale suit and tie were all a waste of effort.

And before you get too excited – nothing happened in court.

When we left the building, the desperate Super One people were still there. Perhaps they had borrowed Joseph Musumeci’s famous picnic cooler and stuffed it with provisions (‘Oh look, what’s this? A Melita Cable connection box!’). They followed us down the road, up the road, and sideways. They used their mike to eavesdrop on our conversation and when we called a policewoman to stop the harassment, Charlon Gouder came up and actually towed her away by the arm, and the policewoman went off with him beaming.

We intended to eat lunch on the square at Malata, but the prospect of an entire lunch with Charlon Gouder and those ugly goblins with their cameras rolling was too much. So we went elsewhere, indoors.

While we walked and the goblins filmed, I amused myself and rendered tracts of their footage unusable by asking the cameraman ‘FEJN QIEGHED CHARLON GOUDER? JAQAW MAR MA’ XI QAHBA LI SERQITLU L-PORTMONI U SPICCA GHAND IL-PULIZIJA JAGHMEL RAPPORT?’

This threw the chickens into a frazzle.

They were dying to use it, to show how rude and arrogant I am, but they couldn’t exactly do so – especially not when Charlon Gouder himself was reading the news item in question. So the Super One headline was that I made a ‘xenata’ and insulted their cameraman – but then they bleeped the whole thing out except for the words ‘Charlon Gouder’.

I think it’s wrong that you should be deprived of knowing the exact nature of what was bleeped out, so here it is again: ‘FEJN QIEGHED CHARLON GOUDER? JAQAW MAR MA’ XI QAHBA LI SERQITLU L-PORTMONI U SPICCA GHAND IL-PULIZIJA JAGHMEL RAPPORT?’

What a bunch of pathetic prats.