Attempted murder of Romanian lover: we expect to see the arrest and prosecution of Yana Mintoff or her son

The information controlled by the police in the immediate aftermath of the knife fight in former premier Dom Mintoff’s daughter’s home led the press and the public to understand that Yana Mintoff Bland and her son Daniel Mainwaring had been assaulted and dangerously wounded by her much younger Romanian lover, who then hid himself up a tree so that the police couldn’t get at him.

It has since transpired that Mrs Mintoff Bland’s wounds were so slight that she was discharged immediately from the A & E Department, and her son’s thigh wound necessitated his being kept in hospital for observation. But Gheorghe Popa, Mrs Mintoff Bland’s lover, was so seriously wounded that he had to be kept in intensive care. In an attempt on his life, he had been stabbed in the stomach and “organs were punctured”. The wounds were not self-inflicted. He had scrambled up that tree to escape, yes, but not from the police.

There has been no news about arrests or formal charges for assault or attempted murder, and the Labour/government-controlled media have maintained a frightening silence over the matter – frightening because this is yet another clear indication that these media instruments are being used to protect certain individuals while going after others.

Given the current context of political and police corruption, there is a very real danger that, without thorough media scrutiny, the person – whether it was Dom Mintoff’s daughter or Dom Mintoff’s grandson – who stabbed Gheorghe Popa in the stomach and almost killed him will get away with attempted murder.

Popa is a penniless immigrant who can’t speak English, and to whom his Maltese lover’s political connections and influence have been made amply clear over the last three years he has lived with her and off her, years which coincide precisely with the Labour Party being in power. The chances that he will be intimidated, rather than questioned, by the police are significant.

The chances that Dom Mintoff’s daughter and grandson – and I describe them that way intentionally because that is the context for their special treatment – will not be interrogated at all, let alone be charged with attempted murder, are considerable.

The press needs to keep this story under scrutiny. It is not a ‘gossip story’. Nor is it a ‘private life’ story. This is no ordinary domestic quarrel but one which led to Mrs Mintoff’s lover receiving a stab wound aimed to kill him.

It is a story about potential corruption and abuse, with the perpetrator turned into the victim and the victim into the perpetrator, and a person not being prosecuted for attempted murder either because that person is Dom Mintoff’s daughter or because he is Dom Mintoff’s grandson.

Yana Mintoff Bland with Konrad Mizzi at the vote-counting hall in the last general election.