Speaker 1: Freedom of speech in a real democracy is something which
Speaker 1: the people impose on the government, and not the other
Speaker 1: way round. That's what is wrong with Malta. It's a
Speaker 1: society in which freedom of speech has had to be
Speaker 1: imposed on a public that rejects it because it doesn't
Speaker 1: understand the imperatives that drive it.
Speaker 2: For the Record, interview with George de Georgia, fifth December
Speaker 2: twenty seventeen.
Speaker 3: It's twenty four hours after the swat raid on the
Speaker 3: potato shed on the Marsaki side and the arrest of
Speaker 3: Daphne's three assassins, Chinese George de Georgio, his brother Alfred
Speaker 3: de Bin de Georgio and Vincent the kop Moscat. We're
Speaker 3: in a small interrogation room, one table in the futures
Speaker 3: and on your recorder picking up everywhord. It's time for
Speaker 3: Chinese George, the man who triggered the car bomb that
Speaker 3: killed Dephanie, to be asked some questions.
Speaker 4: Chinese George looks like what he is, middle aged, thinning hair,
Speaker 4: a squat, heavy set guy, maybe a little out of shape,
Speaker 4: but still unmistakably an intimidating presence.
Speaker 3: Think tony soprano, not so smart, not so tall, but
Speaker 3: about as ruthless. It's not the first time he spent
Speaker 3: a night in custody. This is a man who has
Speaker 3: been in interrogation rooms like this many times before, and
Speaker 3: one who has walked free before.
Speaker 4: Across the table from Chinese George is Inspector Keith Arnaud,
Speaker 4: the leader of the investigation into Daphnese murder, one of
Speaker 4: Malter's most experienced homicide investigators.
Speaker 3: Also in the room is Inspector Zara, his colleague and.
Speaker 4: The warning this will be a somewhat one sided conversation.
Speaker 5: George, please, how old are you? I'll ask you again,
Speaker 5: how old are you? George?
Speaker 4: What you're hearing our actions? And a recreation based on
Speaker 4: lead transcripts from an interrogation at Multipolice ARGQ. We translated
Speaker 4: it into English.
Speaker 3: And the unwritten code for Chinese George in this situation
Speaker 3: is clear, don't talk to cops.
Speaker 5: In that case. What is your father's name? George?
Speaker 3: In fairness, Inspector are not does already have all this
Speaker 3: information and much more. But this isn't about George's name
Speaker 3: or his father. It's about who is really in control
Speaker 3: in this interview room.
Speaker 2: As we told you yesterday, George, and as is written
Speaker 2: on the arrest warrant, we have arrested you on suspicion
Speaker 2: of the murder of the journalist Dafnie Carbona Galizia.
Speaker 5: Do you have anything to say to this?
Speaker 4: After the preliminaries, Inspector Arnau gets right to it. He
Speaker 4: directly asks the first question that he doesn't yet know
Speaker 4: the answer to.
Speaker 2: George, did you know that we were coming for you?
Speaker 4: From my hard podcast topic Studios in Vespucci, I'm.
Speaker 3: John Sweeney and I'm Manuel Delia.
Speaker 4: And this is Crooks Everywhere, Episode four, you knew we
Speaker 4: were coming.
Speaker 3: In the interview room, Inspector Arnaut is feeling the heat
Speaker 3: regardless of her conditioning. This is the biggest case of
Speaker 3: his career and also maybe the riskiest. A lot of
Speaker 3: people will be very unhappy if this case isn't solved,
Speaker 3: not just in Malta but around the world, but some
Speaker 3: very powerful people in Malta will probably also be unhappy
Speaker 3: if it is solved. Both sides have a lot riding
Speaker 3: on this.
Speaker 4: And if there are mistakes made, everyone will be looking
Speaker 4: for someone to apply.
Speaker 2: Exhibit KK three is a photo of a reproduction of
Speaker 2: the device that triggered the bomb an electronic circuit connected
Speaker 2: to a SIM card, with the card remotely activated by
Speaker 2: text message. We have proof that you were the person
Speaker 2: who sent this SMS?
Speaker 5: Is this true.
Speaker 3: And Inspector Arnold's favor is the mountain of forensic and
Speaker 3: electronic data evidence, enabled by the assistance from the FBI
Speaker 3: and other foreign forces, and supplemented with phone taps and
Speaker 3: local CCDV at TODBT discoveries made after debate.
Speaker 4: Immediately after the arrest, police divers search the bottom of
Speaker 4: the harbor next to the keyside by the potato shed,
Speaker 4: and they found the seabed was littered with discarded phones,
Speaker 4: including the phones used in Daphne's murder. Some of the
Speaker 4: SIM cards still work and can have their call data
Speaker 4: extracted from them. So what's the story behind the underwater
Speaker 4: phone museum. It means that someone in the potato shed
Speaker 4: has a routine when a burnaphone contains incriminating information and
Speaker 4: the job's done, it's thrown over the keyside into the water.
Speaker 4: The problem is, this isn't the open sea, so instead
Speaker 4: of being washed away forever, all these phones are waiting
Speaker 4: in the mud five feet down in the place for
Speaker 4: the authorities to come and find them.
Speaker 3: It's a huge breakthrough for Inspact that are and the
Speaker 3: FBI team helping him.
Speaker 2: As you can see, George, we are dealing with facts
Speaker 2: here in controvertible technical evidence. No one will ever be
Speaker 2: able to say I must have been confused, I misremembered.
Speaker 2: Oh this actually means something else. Uh no, So I
Speaker 2: think you'd be wiser to tell me what you have
Speaker 2: to say.
Speaker 4: About all this. He's right. The phone evidence, both location
Speaker 4: data and recording of cause is damning. And it's also
Speaker 4: not the kind of evidence that witness intimidation can change.
Speaker 4: That's one Inspector Arno is hinting at when he talks
Speaker 4: to people becoming confused or misremembering on the witness stand.
Speaker 3: Witnesses often get forgetful in trials involving organized crime.
Speaker 4: But this brings Inspector arna back to his earlier question,
Speaker 4: the question that he still can't figure out how the
Speaker 4: criminals seemed to be expecting him and his offices in
Speaker 4: the SWAT raid. There's a whole range of clues that
Speaker 4: suggests this.
Speaker 2: What was the reason, for example, that we did not
Speaker 2: find the keys to the room and.
Speaker 5: Your mobile phones? Your mobile phone disappeared.
Speaker 3: It turns out that all of the killers had conveniently
Speaker 3: just lost their mobile phones when the raid took place.
Speaker 2: Why did you have the phone number of your girlfriend
Speaker 2: written on your arm, Georgia, on your wrist? Is it
Speaker 2: normal for anyone to write the number of his woman
Speaker 2: on his arm?
Speaker 5: Isn't that right?
Speaker 3: The mobile number of George's girlfriend is scrawled on his skin,
Speaker 3: and pen Inspector Arno is right. It's a strange way
Speaker 3: to keep important phone numbers. But if you know you
Speaker 3: are about to be raided by the police and you
Speaker 3: are planning to throw away your cell phone, then it
Speaker 3: makes more sense.
Speaker 4: And then there is the dog that didn't bark. George
Speaker 4: has a much which he usually keeps in the potato
Speaker 4: shed to act as a guard dog. But on the
Speaker 4: day of the swat rate, the guard dog with a wall.
Speaker 2: And what about the dog, the dog you usually take
Speaker 2: to the potato shed.
Speaker 5: What happened to it? Why wasn't that dog tied up
Speaker 5: in her usual place?
Speaker 3: Of course, this is another thing that makes more sense
Speaker 3: if you are expecting a heavily armed police rate. If
Speaker 3: you know as what rate is coming, you would want
Speaker 3: to make sure that your loyal guard dog is locked
Speaker 3: away somewhere safe in advance, out of harm's way. One
Speaker 3: thing is pretty clear and what has most high profile
Speaker 3: murder investigation. Somehow the criminals already know every move the
Speaker 3: law has planned before it happens. And the question is how.
Speaker 5: George known for a long time that we were coming.
Speaker 4: Even if George and the other killers appear cool under pressure,
Speaker 4: the mood of the rest of the country is far
Speaker 4: from calm at this time, both the Daphne's supporters and
Speaker 4: her enemies.
Speaker 3: Let's start with the supporters. The initial wave of protests
Speaker 3: centered around the Great Siege Monument isn't dying away. In fact,
Speaker 3: around the time of the swat rate, it is growing
Speaker 3: stronger and proving to be an even bigger source of
Speaker 3: annoyance to the government. And Daphne's role as a groundbreaking
Speaker 3: female journalist in Mota is particularly important to many protesters.
Speaker 6: Shortly after Daphanie I was killed, I was pulling the
Speaker 6: news and the parliament resumed and the opposition wanted to
Speaker 6: put on the table that they should have a debate about,
Speaker 6: you know, the killing of Deafhnite.
Speaker 3: This is one of the protest leaders. French born Cleman s. Dujardin,
Speaker 3: a software CEO who has lived in More since the
Speaker 3: early two thousands. Someone I know a bit. We've been
Speaker 3: married seven years.
Speaker 6: And as I'm watching that going on, the government to
Speaker 6: refuses to have that debt on that day, and I'm
Speaker 6: sitting there and I'm expecting a position to walk out
Speaker 6: of Parliament, you know, in protests, and the opposition stayed there.
Speaker 6: And I said no, I mean, if we don't even
Speaker 6: have an opposition that is going to try to protect
Speaker 6: this country and to step up and do something about it,
Speaker 6: then we must do something about it. So I called
Speaker 6: my friend Pi. I told Elisten pre and I'm going
Speaker 6: to sleep in front of Castile Castill it's the office
Speaker 6: of the Prime Minister. And I thought that that's where
Speaker 6: I'm going to sleep, and she told me, okay, she
Speaker 6: told me, I'll join you. We wanted women to protest
Speaker 6: for the women that they killed.
Speaker 3: Multiic politics are still incredibly male dominated. But the protests
Speaker 3: and definitely's memory, weren't.
Speaker 6: People understood that, you know, it needed to be led
Speaker 6: by women. At first.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 6: On Castile Square, maybe we may have had ten twelve tents,
Speaker 6: so not many people but then people started coming. So
Speaker 6: in the evening a lot of people came to the
Speaker 6: square and started bringing food, bringing drinks. Actually, on the
Speaker 6: first evening defn Kamana gal It's as family centers, a
Speaker 6: stock of pizzas with the famous lorel leaves that simbolized
Speaker 6: definitely now. And that's how it started, you know. And
Speaker 6: the next day more people came with their tents and slaps,
Speaker 6: and that's how it.
Speaker 7: Go This was the start of Malta's first female lad
Speaker 7: and corruption movement, known as Occupy Justice.
Speaker 6: So it had gone in two thousands of people joining
Speaker 6: in the evening on Saturday evening, the square was packed
Speaker 6: and you know, and people were not necessarily sad, you know,
Speaker 6: it wasn't happy, but you know, the renion of people
Speaker 6: that needed to be there all to get all together
Speaker 6: and have a sense of belonging, of doing something may
Speaker 6: be useful.
Speaker 4: And Manuel, you were part of the wider protest movement.
Speaker 3: Too, I was for many of us at the time.
Speaker 3: The protests were one of the very few positive things
Speaker 3: to come out of the whole tragedy. It did feel
Speaker 3: like a great mass of people who had been silent
Speaker 3: were now speaking up, attending protests and vigils, and there
Speaker 3: were many more of us than we ever dreamed. And
Speaker 3: so when news came of the swat trade and that
Speaker 3: the police had three of Daphnie's assassins and custody, there
Speaker 3: was both relief and anxiety, really because it seemed that
Speaker 3: some kind of progress was being made, but anxiety because
Speaker 3: many of us suspected even then that those three men
Speaker 3: were just foot soldiers. Someone else must have given orders
Speaker 3: to Chinese George de Georgio, Alfred de Bin de Georgio
Speaker 3: and Vincent de Kov.
Speaker 4: So we're parked directly in front of a really sensationally
Speaker 4: baroque church. And what's extraordinary is this. This isn't a
Speaker 4: very very big place, but the church is magnificent.
Speaker 3: We're we're in Saint Nicholas Square in Sijiwi, which is
Speaker 3: a village to the southwest of Valletta.
Speaker 4: There's a couple of tourists doing a selfie on a
Speaker 4: stick just close by, but we're not here for the tourists,
Speaker 4: and we're not here for the beautiful baroque church. We're
Speaker 4: here because there's a rather sweet looking bar on the
Speaker 4: corner and it's got a nice red awning which is
Speaker 4: flickering a little bit in the afternoon summer's breeze, as
Speaker 4: an old wooden blackboard thing something scribbled on it. I
Speaker 4: quite fancy a drink? Can we go for a drink?
Speaker 5: Them?
Speaker 4: And will?
Speaker 3: I think I'll pass. The reason I wanted to show
Speaker 3: it to you was not tourism. It's a bit of
Speaker 3: a watering hole for all sorts of different people. But
Speaker 3: a couple of French journalists, reporting about six months after
Speaker 3: Daphne was killed, came here because they were pointed to
Speaker 3: the place as a favorite of the the Georgio brothers.
Speaker 3: They'd come drinking here, and they asked locals with hidden
Speaker 3: microphones if they knew that the Georgia was They said
Speaker 3: they did, and if they saw him drinking here, and
Speaker 3: they said they did. And then they asked them if
Speaker 3: they had notorious or famous friends. And the name that
Speaker 3: came up was Chris Cardona, the economy minister.
Speaker 4: So I find this really incredible that you've got a
Speaker 4: cabinet minister of a country who drinks with two hit men.
Speaker 3: He would he would have explained that away by saying
Speaker 3: he was a lawyer that used to practicing the criminal courts.
Speaker 3: One person who was here speaking to the reporters distinctly
Speaker 3: remembered Chris Cardona and Alfred de Georgio having a sullen
Speaker 3: conversation for about an hour in this bar, and then
Speaker 3: they went out for a walk.
Speaker 4: When was the date of that conversation, Roughly it.
Speaker 3: Was a few days before the Georgias were arrested November
Speaker 3: twenty seventeen.
Speaker 4: And when they're arrested, the evidence seems to be that
Speaker 4: they knew that they were about to be raided, because,
Speaker 4: for example, one of them had written his girlfriend's number
Speaker 4: on his on his on his hand, on his skin.
Speaker 4: Just the story at least suggests that the inside and
Speaker 4: who tipped them off could have been Economics minister at
Speaker 4: the time, Chris Cardona. What does Cardona himself say about this?
Speaker 3: Chris Cardona denies any and all wrongdoing and says he's
Speaker 3: never had anything to do with the killing of defne
Speaker 3: Caarona Galicia or the plotting of it. But he did
Speaker 3: not try to explain away why he was drinking with
Speaker 3: someone who a week later would be arrested and charged
Speaker 3: with killing define Karona Galicia. We've heard about Chris cardoona before.
Speaker 3: He is the same government minister that was noticed by
Speaker 3: Dafne's sons and widower visiting the law courts as a
Speaker 3: person of interest on the night of Dafnie's murder. He
Speaker 3: chose not to respond to requests for an interview with
Speaker 3: this podcast.
Speaker 4: In twenty seventeen. Chris Cardooner has repeatedly denied any involvement
Speaker 4: in the murder of Daphne Caroina Galiticia. However, he has
Speaker 4: admitted to knowing Alfred de Bean de Georgia through his
Speaker 4: previous work as a criminal lawyer.
Speaker 3: And Daphnie and mister Cardona also had a history. In fact,
Speaker 3: Cardonah was one of the government politicians Daphne was most
Speaker 3: famous for writing about, along with the Prime Minister Joseph
Speaker 3: Moscat As Economy Minister. Cardona was a very senior minister
Speaker 3: who was also a deputy leader of the ruling Labor Party,
Speaker 3: so a key player, and Cardona has reason not to
Speaker 3: be particularly the fond of Daphne.
Speaker 1: January thirtieth, twenty seventeen, breaking Malta's Economy Minister Labour Party
Speaker 1: deputy leader in German Brothel Tonight.
Speaker 3: Issue Daphnie over one of her most famous stories Daphne's
Speaker 3: report was posted while mister Cardona was still allegedly in
Speaker 3: the brothel itself.
Speaker 1: Malta's Minister for the Economy, Chris card is currently at
Speaker 1: a brothel in the German town of Velbert, near Disseldorff.
Speaker 1: Patrons pay eighty euros to get in through the door
Speaker 1: at the FKK Akapulco are given food and drinks, but
Speaker 1: must then pay for sex with the girls and women.
Speaker 3: Definitely claimed to have a source inside the brothel feeding
Speaker 3: her information and definitely always prided herself on providing the
Speaker 3: most embarrassing alleged details.
Speaker 1: The FKK Acapulco includes a sauna, and at one point,
Speaker 1: at around eight pm, the Economy Minister emerged naked from
Speaker 1: the shower, shouting alakesa Leima, God, damn, this water is cold.
Speaker 1: At this time of night, no government spokesman or communications
Speaker 1: aids are available to take questions on whether the Economy
Speaker 1: Minister is in Germany on official government business and if so,
Speaker 1: whether his visit to a brothel will be passed off
Speaker 1: as travel expenses along with his mini bar bill.
Speaker 3: And from that moment on just the name of the brothel,
Speaker 3: the Acapulco became a punchline in Malta.
Speaker 8: There were people who were thought that it was hilarious,
Speaker 8: you know, like a minister being spotted in a brothel
Speaker 8: in Germany is absolutely scandalous. What the hell is a
Speaker 8: politician doing, like on government work abroad, but in a brothel.
Speaker 3: Nicole Malak is a journalist at Molta.
Speaker 8: Today and obviously when that broke, it had such an
Speaker 8: impact in the news tycho when it broke, so it
Speaker 8: was hard not to find out about it. Like even
Speaker 8: if you weren't following local news at the time, you
Speaker 8: knew that this happened and that this broke, and that
Speaker 8: definite Karwana Galicia reported it, but.
Speaker 3: Definitely had more to say. The very next day she
Speaker 3: posted a further.
Speaker 1: Update, breaking brothelgate. The Economy Minister went to the same
Speaker 1: brothel again today. It's just occurred to me that the
Speaker 1: minister and his consultant wouldn't have gone back for sex
Speaker 1: this afternoon but for negotiation on making sure their backs
Speaker 1: are covered. Given that the story had broken and the
Speaker 1: minister had issued a press release of denial.
Speaker 3: It was one of the moments when her writing moved
Speaker 3: beyond the niche of political blogging. In English to setting
Speaker 3: the news agenda for the whole country, and as definitely mentioned,
Speaker 3: Cardona fiercely denied the story from the start and has
Speaker 3: ever since, but Defne, enjoying the fight, responded with more
Speaker 3: posts and more details.
Speaker 1: My source, who saw rather too much of our naked
Speaker 1: government minister at the Velbert brothel, has now specified that
Speaker 1: the tattoo of Cheguraara's face is on Chris Cardona's right
Speaker 1: shoulder to the back and is done in blue ink.
Speaker 1: I asked whether he also has, say nipple ring or
Speaker 1: one of those doodars they snip into the end of
Speaker 1: their uncircumcised Frankfurt sausage, and was told sadly not.
Speaker 3: It was all the things that made Defnie and her
Speaker 3: writing so popular and so different from mainstream Multese journalism, rude, chatty, scandalous,
Speaker 3: insulting and completely unafraid of authority.
Speaker 4: And then she began reporting on the reporting of her story.
Speaker 1: The Minister for the Economy, who spent the evening of Monday,
Speaker 1: the thirtieth of January in a brothel in Velbert, Germany,
Speaker 1: is currently lying through his teeth on Reno Bujea's TVM
Speaker 1: show des Set, except that his lies take a very
Speaker 1: interesting form. Instead of lying about where he was, instead
Speaker 1: of where he really was, he says it's all lies.
Speaker 1: Like other journalists. Boujaya tried to press him a little
Speaker 1: on where he was instead and got the stock answer,
Speaker 1: I'll prove it in court, and then in the next breath,
Speaker 1: the same reply he has given others. I don't have
Speaker 1: to prove anything.
Speaker 3: She does.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised nobody seems to have noticed what's going on here.
Speaker 1: He's refusing to present his proof to the media in
Speaker 1: the here and now and says he will wait for
Speaker 1: the court cases and prove it under oath, but then
Speaker 1: says he doesn't have to prove anything because the burden
Speaker 1: of proof in libel cases is on the other party.
Speaker 4: And here is where this story took a turn that
Speaker 4: in most democracies would be unthinkable.
Speaker 1: February eighth, twenty seventeen, the Minister for the Economy and
Speaker 1: his policy officer have frozen my bank accounts. My statement
Speaker 1: issued to all media.
Speaker 7: Today.
Speaker 1: Both men took the exceptional measure of filing precautionary warrants
Speaker 1: on my assets for the maximum libel damages that would
Speaker 1: be payable to them should they win all four cases.
Speaker 1: Eleven eight hundred and sixty five euros times four equals
Speaker 1: forty seven, four hundred and sixty euros. My bank accounts
Speaker 1: have consequently been frozen to this amount and will remain
Speaker 1: frozen to that amount until the case is concluded, many
Speaker 1: years from now.
Speaker 3: A quick summary, A journalist writes a story about a politician.
Speaker 3: He sues her, but before the case can even begin,
Speaker 3: all her personal bank guards stop working as part of
Speaker 3: the court proceedings.
Speaker 4: It's an incredible show of power. Daphnie has been sued
Speaker 4: for libel many times before, and defending those suits was
Speaker 4: in itself a huge financial burden. But freezing her bank
Speaker 4: accounts over a libel case that hadn't even begun. No
Speaker 4: one could remember that ever happening to a journalist before.
Speaker 3: In Malta.
Speaker 1: The implications for democracy and for the freedom of the
Speaker 1: press are terrible. There is no initial process of scrutiny
Speaker 1: for civil libel suits, and politicians can sue on the
Speaker 1: most frivolous basis. The system as it stands is ripe
Speaker 1: for abuse by politicians who try to silence the journalists
Speaker 1: who expose them so that their wrongdoing is not exposed.
Speaker 1: It should be clear to anyone that the Minister for
Speaker 1: the Economy and his EU Presidency policy officer wish to
Speaker 1: harass me for what I have reported about them, obtain revenge,
Speaker 1: punish me, and beyond that also silence others who have
Speaker 1: picked the story. The idea is to create what the
Speaker 1: European Court of Human Rights, in its judgments on freedom
Speaker 1: of the press matters, calls a chilling effect.
Speaker 3: Daphne was murdered eight months later, and the reason she
Speaker 3: left her house that day and got into her car,
Speaker 3: not knowing there was a bomb in it, was because
Speaker 3: she needed to go to an appointment with her bank
Speaker 3: because her cards were frozen.
Speaker 4: The libel law in Malta has since been changed so
Speaker 4: that this kind of financial throttling before a case is
Speaker 4: even started cannot happen again.
Speaker 3: But remarkably, even Daphne's murder didn't end the legal battles
Speaker 3: with Cardona. Under another quirk of Maltese law, libel cases
Speaker 3: are passed on to your descendants in the event of
Speaker 3: your death.
Speaker 4: So like a family heirloom, the have been inherited by
Speaker 4: those she left behind.
Speaker 3: Daphne's grief stricken sons and with over found themselves appearing
Speaker 3: in court and spending money to defend themselves from a
Speaker 3: court action over blog posts that they had no part
Speaker 3: in writing. It was just one of over forty cases
Speaker 3: that were outstanding against Deafhanie at the time of her death,
Speaker 3: and which then were passed on to her family.
Speaker 4: Again, none of this is something that would happen in
Speaker 4: most other European democracies.
Speaker 3: Daphne's family wanted to fight the case, believing that phone
Speaker 3: data would prove her version of events. After the court
Speaker 3: ordered the phone company to preserve the data showing where
Speaker 3: mister Cardona's phone had been that faithful night, he failed
Speaker 3: to show up in court every time he was due
Speaker 3: to testify. Eventually the case was dropped.
Speaker 4: So to summarize, Jaffney accused the minister visiting a brothel
Speaker 4: while on government business. The minister sued her for libel,
Speaker 4: freezing her bank accounts before the case had come to court. Then,
Speaker 4: even after her murder, the case continued, with Japhane's sons
Speaker 4: defending their mother's journalism and the minister refusing to appear
Speaker 4: in court or present evidence to support his version of events,
Speaker 4: even though he was bringing the case.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Malta. Cardona has claimed that he never dropped
Speaker 3: the charges and that it was Daphane's family who moved
Speaker 3: to have the charges dropped, And so a few months
Speaker 3: after Daphane's death, that's where the ballad of Daphne and
Speaker 3: Chris Cardona would have rested. Cardona certainly had a bitter
Speaker 3: dispute with her, but their conflict seemed to have been
Speaker 3: limited to the pages of her blog and the court system.
Speaker 4: But new bits of the story kept on coming out,
Speaker 4: which is how we get back to the sleepy village
Speaker 4: bar by the baroque church in Sijiwi and the question
Speaker 4: of how Daphine's assassins somehow knew exactly when the police
Speaker 4: were gonna come for them, And this is where even
Speaker 4: the simplest facts become.
Speaker 3: Hazy again, Welcome to Malta. So a team of investigative
Speaker 3: journalists from the French media Franz De and Radio Franz
Speaker 3: had heard rumors that Cardona had some kind of connection
Speaker 3: to at least one of the assassins, Alfred Deben the Georgio.
Speaker 3: To test that out, they visited this Egeui bar undercover
Speaker 3: and used hidden cameras to speak to regular drinkers there.
Speaker 3: You can still watch the undercover footage online. Cardona at
Speaker 3: first denied it all. He did quote not recall having
Speaker 3: any discussions with any of the killers, and slightly denied
Speaker 3: meeting them at the bar, but he conceded that he
Speaker 3: was a regular at the bar, that it was possible
Speaker 3: that the Georgio brothers might have been in attendance.
Speaker 4: Too, and that wasn't all. Gradually, more pieces of evidence
Speaker 4: began to emerge, suggesting interactions between the killers and Chris Cardona.
Speaker 4: For example, several eyewitnesses told the media that Alfred the
Speaker 4: Bean and Chris Cardona had both been guessed at the
Speaker 4: same bachelor party five months before Daphne's death. Cardona said
Speaker 4: he couldn't remember seeing Alfred the Bean at the party
Speaker 4: and had left after ten minutes anyway. He admitted that
Speaker 4: he knew one of them, the Georgia brothers, from his
Speaker 4: work as a criminal lawyer, but was not friends with
Speaker 4: him in the sense that they would visit each other's houses.
Speaker 3: In a statement in twenty eighteen, Cardona responded in the
Speaker 3: Times of Malta to the suggestion that he might be
Speaker 3: involved in Daphne's murder. This extract from the statement is
Speaker 3: read by an actor.
Speaker 9: I understand that the victims' families and indeed the public
Speaker 9: swant for answers, but attempting at all costs to make
Speaker 9: the public believe that there was any type of involvement
Speaker 9: from my end, is purely absurd and unjust and will
Speaker 9: definitely not help investigations, nor will it help to lead
Speaker 9: to further answers, but will merely fuel the sensationalism surrounding
Speaker 9: such a barbaric act, to the detriment of the public
Speaker 9: and the investigation itself.
Speaker 3: Which takes us back to the central question for Inspector
Speaker 3: Arnaut in the weeks after the Swat raid. How did
Speaker 3: Dafnese killers know that the police were going to raid them?
Speaker 3: Who warned them? And why Chris Cardona potentially had a
Speaker 3: motive because of what definitely had written about him the
Speaker 3: minister in the brothel story, and he could have warned
Speaker 3: the killers. He knew at least one of the assassins
Speaker 3: and they were seen together by a member of the
Speaker 3: public with him the day before the raid. And as
Speaker 3: a senior government minister in this particular Maltese government, it
Speaker 3: is not far fetch to imagine he could have got
Speaker 3: access to confidential information about the investigation, but fairm evidence
Speaker 3: of any actual involvement is me.
Speaker 4: At this point, the investigation seems to have hit a
Speaker 4: brick wall. The contract killers are in jail but maintaining
Speaker 4: complete silence and clear leads as to who hired them,
Speaker 4: who wanted Dafney dead is still missing, and Chris Cardener
Speaker 4: is never charged with involvement in the murder. But there
Speaker 4: is one other person involved with this story, however, a
Speaker 4: man who becomes very important from this point on.
Speaker 3: A rich and powerful man who will go on to
Speaker 3: be accused of ordering Daphnese murder, although the assassins were
Speaker 3: not hired by him directly.
Speaker 4: After all, dealing directly with contract killers is a difficult business.
Speaker 3: Instead, this powerful man finds someone who can work on
Speaker 3: his behalf to organize the killing, someone who can connect
Speaker 3: the criminal underworld with the world of Multa's economic and
Speaker 3: political elite, a go bit I mean a connection between
Speaker 3: the highest and lowest sections of society. That man's name
Speaker 3: is Melvin Toma, the Middleman, and so far no one
Speaker 3: suspects his involvement in this crime at all. In December
Speaker 3: twenty seventeen, around the time that Chinese George is being
Speaker 3: interrogated at police headquarters in Valletta. Melvin the Middleman Toma
Speaker 3: is here outside Malta's Hilton Hotel behind the wheel of
Speaker 3: a taxi. His thin, dark haired lay thirties with a
Speaker 3: scar across his forehead. Even with that scar, he's bland looking,
Speaker 3: capable of fading into the background. As a taxi driver,
Speaker 3: he has an unusual and extremely desirable gig permission to
Speaker 3: tout folfairs outside the Hilton in the exclusive Port Tomaso
Speaker 3: resort to the north of Valletta. A good earner with
Speaker 3: good tips, but he's also a known face in the
Speaker 3: criminal community, successful in the world of illegal gambling, horses
Speaker 3: and black market lotteries.
Speaker 4: But now, as his engine ticks over outside the Hilton,
Speaker 4: he's questioning his life choices and the aftermath of the
Speaker 4: arrest of Chinese George. Alfred the Bean and Vincent Leacough
Speaker 4: is beginning to feel exposed, and he's right to feel
Speaker 4: that way. He knows that he knows too much, and
Speaker 4: this murder has now proved to be bigger news than
Speaker 4: he or anyone else involved. Imagioned as he waits for
Speaker 4: the next rich foreign tourist to wave him over for
Speaker 4: another fair Melvin, the middle man begins to sweat. Being
Speaker 4: in the middle can be a dangerous place to be.
Speaker 3: That's next time. Crooks Everywhere is a production of iHeart Podcasts,
Speaker 3: Topic Studios and Vespucci. It's reported and hosted by me
Speaker 3: Manuel Delia and John Sweeney. The singer producer is Leo Hornack,
Speaker 3: The producer is Maddi Hickish. Krish Denes Kumar is the
Speaker 3: assistant producer. The story editors are Emma Federill, Matt Willis
Speaker 3: and Philippa Geering. The managing producers are Thomas Curry and
Speaker 3: Rachel Byrne. The voice of Dafnie Carmana Galizia is played
Speaker 3: by Ciena Miller, acting direction by Christopher Houghten. Multese voices
Speaker 3: by Mikhael basma Jan and Pierre Staffrach. The executive producers
Speaker 3: are Johnny Galvin and Daniel Turken at Vespucci, Christi Gressman
Speaker 3: at Topic Studios, Katina Norvel and Nikki Etoor at iHeart
Speaker 3: Podcasts and Ciena Miller. Marketing lead is David Wessemann. Audio
Speaker 3: recording by Tom Berry at Wardoor Studios. Audio mix and
Speaker 3: sound designed by Joel Cox. Special thanks to Andrew Botchcardona,
Speaker 3: Alessandra di Crespo, Eddie Isles, and Andrew Carvana, Galicia