There was a very serious revelation in Court today regarding the previous Opposition Leader Simon Busuttil’s request for a Magisterial Inquiry into 17 Black.
According to evidence presented in Court today, Yorgen Fenech received an unsigned copy of a court decision concerning the 17 Black proceedings several hours before it was signed and officially communicated to the parties. Prosecutor Godwin Cini put it to Fenech that the document had reached him around four hours before it was formally signed, asking whether it had therefore come from inside the Courts.
The legal proceedings began earlier. On 26 July 2017, Magistrate Ian Farrugia ruled that there were sufficient grounds for a magisterial inquiry into the Panama Papers allegations involving Keith Schembri, Konrad Mizzi and others.
Subsequently, on 20 April 2018, Simon Busuttil and David Casa filed a separate application before Magistrate Francesco Depasquale seeking an inquiry into the newly published 17 Black revelations.
On 21 May 2018, Magistrate Depasquale ruled that the legal prerequisites for an investigation appeared to exist in relation to Konrad Mizzi, Keith Schembri, Brian Tonna and Karl Cini. However, he refused to open a separate 17 Black inquiry because he considered that the allegations overlapped with the Panama Papers inquiry already ordered by Magistrate Ian Farrugia. He therefore ordered the 17 Black evidence and documentation to be incorporated into that inquiry.
On 8 January 2019, Judge Giovanni Grixti, sitting in the Criminal Court on appeal, revoked Magistrate Farrugia’s July 2017 decree ordering the Panama Papers inquiry. This effectively removed the inquiry into which the 17 Black evidence had been transferred.
Finally, on 29 January 2019, Magistrate Depasquale rejected an attempt by Simon Busuttil and David Casa to revive their separate 17 Black inquiry following the revocation of Farrugia’s decree.
It is Judge Giovanni Grixti who effectively killed the 17 Black inquiry. What is very interesting about this is that Judge Giovanni Grixti had previously bought a yacht from Yorgen Fenech’s father, George Fenech, on 15 September 2008, when Grixti was still a magistrate.
The other interesting point to raise is that Magistrate Ian Farrugia resigned in 2025 on so-called “personal reasons”. Originally, he was the Magistrate who gave the go-ahead to the Panama Papers inquiry and it would be interesting to know from him why he eventually resigned and whether he encountered any interference in his work.
Yet again, the Prosecutor has ample evidence of corruption, and the leaks to Yorgen Fenech concerning magisterial decrees should raise grave concerns and trigger serious investigations. Yet, so far, I have been investigated and pursued more rigorously over NuxellinaLeaks than anyone appears to have been over these potentially grave perversions of justice.
Feature photo by Times of Malta.
Website Editor
Historian and Publisher
Leave a Reply