Speaker 1: And O to the listeners. This episode contains a reference
Speaker 1: to suicide.
Speaker 2: Corruption, especially between the media and politicians. Eats away at
Speaker 2: the heart of democracy.
Speaker 3: Cord in prison, Malta. Right here we will early twenty eighteen,
Speaker 3: about six months after Daphne's murder. Daphne's free assassins, Vincent Lakoff,
Speaker 3: Chinese George and Alfred the Bean have been held here
Speaker 3: on pre trial detention since before Christmas. What follows is
Speaker 3: a dramatization based on courtroom testimony by Vincent the kaff Muscat.
Speaker 3: We provided color in places without changing any of the
Speaker 3: material facts or allegations. The defendants are entitled to regular
Speaker 3: meetings with their lawyer, and today one of the those
Speaker 3: conferences is scheduled. The three of them are gathered here
Speaker 3: in the meeting room, sitting alongside one another, a guard
Speaker 3: by the door.
Speaker 1: Three middle aged contract killers, no doubt familiar with the
Speaker 1: frequent rituals of Malta's legal system when it comes to
Speaker 1: organized crime, arrest, interrogation, delay, confinement, postponement and then all
Speaker 1: too often temporary release which eventually becomes permanent.
Speaker 3: And are so often in prison life at the moment
Speaker 3: they're stuck wasting their lawyer has so far failed to
Speaker 3: show up.
Speaker 1: Since the arrests, things have mostly been going in the favor.
Speaker 1: In the outside world, the battle to uncover the plot
Speaker 1: to kill Daphane has reached a stalemate. Public protests that
Speaker 1: Daphanie's murder have become a permanent feature of Maltese politics,
Speaker 1: but the government appears to be weathering them.
Speaker 3: Jephane's family are trying to bring international political pressure to
Speaker 3: bear on the Mall's government, and they're helping a team
Speaker 3: of investigative journalists to reinvestigate loose ends in her stories,
Speaker 3: but so far, nothing that's been published has led to
Speaker 3: a breakthrough.
Speaker 1: The one man who does know all the details of
Speaker 1: the plot, Melvin the Middleman, is struggling to keep his
Speaker 1: life together under the strain of the secrets he carries.
Speaker 1: He's drinking heavily, even contemplating ending it all, but so
Speaker 1: far he is keeping his silence, and all the while,
Speaker 1: the accused architect of the murder, Mister alleged Mastermind, remains
Speaker 1: unnoticed by law enforcement. His wealth and influence probably allow
Speaker 1: him to remain one step ahead of the authorities at
Speaker 1: any time.
Speaker 3: So although the three men in this prison interview room
Speaker 3: are locked up and under investigation for Daphanes's murder. They
Speaker 3: have reason to be quietly confident. If they can just
Speaker 3: stick together and keep their mouths shut, all his attention
Speaker 3: should eventually go away, just like it did after all
Speaker 3: the other car bomb assassinations in Malta.
Speaker 1: But on this day, for the first time, something's not right.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's very very wrong. Ho Chinese George motions
Speaker 1: Vincent the Cough to come closer, close enough so he
Speaker 1: can whisper without the guard.
Speaker 4: Hearing Lisma station by that chilt mind continct with that
Speaker 4: it's my child.
Speaker 1: Chinese George tells Vincent that he didn't sleep a wink
Speaker 1: last night. Something surprising was bothering him his ace. Vincent
Speaker 1: listens with a straight face, unresponsive. Chinese George goes on,
Speaker 1: does Vincent want to tell him something? Are you sure?
Speaker 1: Because he thinks there's something Vincent should be telling him.
Speaker 3: Again, Vincent the Cough doesn't respond, chance.
Speaker 1: It and there it is, the accusation spoken out loud. Vincent,
Speaker 1: you want to speak at the depot. The depot is
Speaker 1: multi slang for police headquarters. In other words, somehow George
Speaker 1: has discovered that Vincent has begun speaking to the police.
Speaker 3: Secretly, Chinese George is accusing his fellow murderer of breaking
Speaker 3: the criminal code of silence after years of knowing each
Speaker 3: other and working together from the Carmel Kirk Coop drive
Speaker 3: by shooting to Daphne's murder. George believes that Vince is
Speaker 3: snitching and snitching about the murder of Daphne Carona Calizzia.
Speaker 1: Before Vince can respond, their lawyer finally entered the role.
Speaker 1: The meeting begins as if nothing has been said. But
Speaker 1: from now on everything has changed between Chinese George and
Speaker 1: Vincent de Kov. The betrayals have begun.
Speaker 3: From iHeart Podcasts, Topic Studios in Vespucci, I'm John Sweeney
Speaker 3: and I'm Manuel Delia and this is Crooks Everywhere, Episode eight,
Speaker 3: The Lion and the Mosquito.
Speaker 5: I was there for one of the earlier sittings, actually
Speaker 5: present in the courtroom, and what impressed me was he
Speaker 5: had George, the George Jaw, who sat in the middle.
Speaker 5: His brother was sitting to his right side, I believe,
Speaker 5: and Vince to his left, and there was this complete silence.
Speaker 3: Kurt Sansone has watched Vincent Lakoff Muscat and the two
Speaker 3: Di Giorgia brothers, Chinese George and Alfred the Bean in Court.
Speaker 3: He is the executive editor of Malta Today and has
Speaker 3: been covering the investigation into Daphnese murder for years.
Speaker 6: Given the dynamic between them, I would say Vince Muscat
Speaker 6: was sort of the person who tagged along to the brothers.
Speaker 1: The junior partner, and perhaps he'd grown tired of all that,
Speaker 1: or since that being the junior partner made him more vulnerable, disposable,
Speaker 1: not part of the inner circle.
Speaker 6: They didn't give him all the information. I mean, they
Speaker 6: just gave him the information that he needed to know. Listen,
Speaker 6: we're going to do this. You'll be here at this time.
Speaker 3: After they're arrested. Vincent Lakoff may also have been under
Speaker 3: greater financial pressure than the other two killers. We don't
Speaker 3: know how much of the unwilling financial support from Melvin
Speaker 3: the middleman reached Vincent. Certainly no one bought his family
Speaker 3: member's pedigree dogs from China.
Speaker 6: It was mainly George, that GEORGEA and Alfred the Georgia
Speaker 6: doing the dealings and making the arrangements which he would
Speaker 6: then obviously willingly tag along and being involved in.
Speaker 3: Or maybe Vincent has realized that Daphne's murder had provoked
Speaker 3: a backlash too large for any of them to ride
Speaker 3: out in silence. If that theory is true, it's a
Speaker 3: real tribute to the Maltese public, the ordinary people who
Speaker 3: keep attending the demonstrations and protests in Daphne's memory for
Speaker 3: month after month after month, refusing to let the story die,
Speaker 3: and without knowing it, spooking her killers.
Speaker 1: Whatever Vincent's reasons, it begins to see greatly negotiating with
Speaker 1: the police for a reduced sentence or a pardon in
Speaker 1: exchange for a confession. And the first piece of information
Speaker 1: he's offering in exchange for his freedom is the name
Speaker 1: of the next guy up in the chain, the man
Speaker 1: who hired him and the the Georgio brothers, Melvin Toma,
Speaker 1: the increasingly panicy Middleman.
Speaker 3: But it turns out that an offering to become an informant,
Speaker 3: Vincent the Cough is miscalculated in two crucial ways. He's
Speaker 3: both underestimated and overestimated multice law enforcement. Underestimated because in fact,
Speaker 3: the authorities are already close to finding out Melvin the
Speaker 3: Middleman's identity. Anyway, the di Giorgio brothers constant demands for
Speaker 3: donations from Melvin has left multiple clues that the authorities
Speaker 3: are able to follow.
Speaker 1: Whenever Chinese George or Alfred de Bean called Mario de Georgio,
Speaker 1: the police are listening, The brothers never refer to Melvin
Speaker 1: by name, instead referring to him as dead guy. But
Speaker 1: it's obvious to the police eavesdroppers that that guy is
Speaker 1: a crucial connection to whoever else was involved in Daphnie's skinning.
Speaker 3: By the time Vincent Leakoff begins negotiating at the depot
Speaker 3: that's the police headquarters, detectives are already watching Mario di
Speaker 3: Giorgio's house, taking photos of Melvin when he visits.
Speaker 1: But Vincent d Koff has also overestimated moul dieselaw enforcement.
Speaker 1: In spite of his knowledge of the crime world, he
Speaker 1: clearly hopes that the police will be able to keep
Speaker 1: his betrayal less secret.
Speaker 3: Perhaps he should have known better. Even by Maltese standards,
Speaker 3: this is not a murder investigation that is secure or
Speaker 3: anything like it. As we've heard, every important breakthrough in
Speaker 3: the case is discussed in the presence of Prime Minister
Speaker 3: Joseph Muscat, his chief of staff Keith Schembri and Jeopardy
Speaker 3: Police Commissioner Sylvio val Letter. And as we've also heard,
Speaker 3: those lasts who are both close personal friends of mister
Speaker 3: alleged Mastermind himself, Keith Skembrie texts mister alleged Mastermind on
Speaker 3: a near daily basis. Deputy Police Commissioner Silvio the Letter
Speaker 3: will later share a family holiday with him.
Speaker 1: So it is not surprising that Vincent de Koff's betrayal
Speaker 1: very quickly reaches mister alleged Mastermind, and then that information
Speaker 1: quickly moves down the chain. According to Paul Karwna Galizia's book,
Speaker 1: when mister Alleged Mastermind passes on the news to Melvin,
Speaker 1: the middleman, he immediately panics, unable to believe it. It's
Speaker 1: not true, it's not true about the cough.
Speaker 3: Melvin's already spent thousands of euros of his own money
Speaker 3: paying for gifts and treats to keep the assassins happy
Speaker 3: behind bars, trying to avoid exactly this outcome.
Speaker 1: But eventually he does believe it. Naturally, he doesn't hesitate
Speaker 1: to pass the bad news further on down the line
Speaker 1: to Chinese George and Alfred de Bean the contract killers
Speaker 1: who are also being betrayed. They are amazed as well,
Speaker 1: and then no doubt ready to take action. Melvin the
Speaker 1: Middleman must know that by informing the the Georgia family
Speaker 1: of Vincent de Kof's betrayal, he could well be triggering
Speaker 1: further than the violence, that he could be signing another
Speaker 1: man's death warrant. And perhaps that's what he intends. We
Speaker 1: can't know, whatever the truth. It's soon after this that
Speaker 1: Vincent de Koff receives that sinister warning while waiting for
Speaker 1: his lawyer to arrive. And that's how Malta's circle of
Speaker 1: corruption works, highly sensitive information apparently flowing from a top
Speaker 1: secret police interrogation, to a high level police briefing, to
Speaker 1: an alleged criminal mastermind, to a middlemen, and onto two
Speaker 1: brutal underworld hitmen.
Speaker 3: After the warning, Vincent the Cough is well aware of
Speaker 3: the danger he's in now. After all, he used to
Speaker 3: be part of the death squad. He requests and gets
Speaker 3: additional protection in the prison he's now guarded. When he eats,
Speaker 3: separated from his fellow killers, he asks his family to
Speaker 3: bring in food so he doesn't have to touch the
Speaker 3: prison meals, who knows what strings that Georgia's might be
Speaker 3: able to pull inside the prison kitchen, and.
Speaker 1: There are the strings they can pull outside. Later in
Speaker 1: Quartron testimony, Vincent Kof said he received a warning that
Speaker 1: his partner and their children might be killed in an
Speaker 1: acid attack, So isn't just watching his own back.
Speaker 3: Jason, as a party Daphnese family lawyer, has experience of
Speaker 3: what these kind of threats can be like. Years later,
Speaker 3: as a party, cross examined Chinese George Georgio in court.
Speaker 3: Chinese George didn't appreciate the line of questioning, so in
Speaker 3: front of the judge, the police, in the entire court,
Speaker 3: he stood up and began saying things that made Jason
Speaker 3: as a party feel threatened.
Speaker 7: If I say it was an enjoyable experience, I would
Speaker 7: be lying. George de Georgia was livid when when he
Speaker 7: was looking at me, and I do remember his eyes,
Speaker 7: I cold ice cold eyes looking at me, terribly angry,
Speaker 7: using very foul language and yes threateningly, and I remember
Speaker 7: you could hear a pin drop.
Speaker 1: After these courtroom threats, Jason as a part of the
Speaker 1: receives offers of asistance from the police, and the threats
Speaker 1: have never been carried out, but back in twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: Vincent d Kov's decision to turn informant has clearly painted
Speaker 1: a target on his back. And it's not just the
Speaker 1: Georgia Emily. He has to worry about the Talmaxar brothers.
Speaker 1: The alleged bomb suppliers also allegedly make a friendly approach
Speaker 1: to Vincent Dakoff's family, offering them money if the Cough
Speaker 1: retracts the statements he's giving to the police. They too
Speaker 1: appear fully informed about Vincentnakoff's confidential discussions with the police.
Speaker 3: After Vincent Nakov's decision to speak to the police, Melvin
Speaker 3: the Middleman begins to feel in even greater danger. As
Speaker 3: we heard, Melvin is already worried that he knows too
Speaker 3: much about mister alleged Masterminds crimes. That is, in spite
Speaker 3: of their closeness, he has become a liability to mister
Speaker 3: alleged Mastermind. If Vincent the Cough gives Melvin's name to
Speaker 3: the police, mister alleged Mastermind will have an even stronger
Speaker 3: incentive to have his old friend disappeared. Melvin the Middleman's
Speaker 3: drinking and drug taking accelerates. He's spiraling downwards.
Speaker 1: It is around this time that Melvin the Middleman drunkenly
Speaker 1: climbs onto the roof of his own house and contemplates
Speaker 1: ending at all, But instead he has a change of heart.
Speaker 1: Instead of jumping, he decides to fight and to use
Speaker 1: the secrets he's carrying to protect himself.
Speaker 3: Soon after, he purchases a second smartphone, but this phone
Speaker 3: isn't for making calls. Instead, one day at home, he
Speaker 3: switches on the new phone and sets it to silent,
Speaker 3: an aeroplane mode. He needs to make sure that it
Speaker 3: cannot receive a call or make a sound. His girlfriend's
Speaker 3: daughter has shown him how to do this.
Speaker 1: More than technology isn't really his.
Speaker 3: Thing, Melvin the Middleman opens a voice recorder app on
Speaker 3: the phone and sets it running, allowing the device to
Speaker 3: record every sound in the room around him. His girlfriend's
Speaker 3: daughter has shown him how to do this too. Now,
Speaker 3: with the voice app running, he locks the phone and
Speaker 3: slips it into his sock, where it stays hidden. From
Speaker 3: now on, whenever he meets mister alleged Mastermind, every word
Speaker 3: will be secretly recorded. Every incriminating remark will be stored
Speaker 3: like the cough. Melvin the Middleman is breaking the ultimate
Speaker 3: taboo of a moral faminalism. He's betraying family.
Speaker 1: Melvin Hobbs dead. The tapes might just give him enough
Speaker 1: leverage to keep himself alive.
Speaker 8: Bevin Toma was saying, Listen is very well connected, immensely rich.
Speaker 8: I'm no one compared to him. I don't have friends
Speaker 8: in high places, and so better take precautions.
Speaker 1: Years later, in court, Melvin Toma will describe mister alleged
Speaker 1: Mastermind as a lion and himself as a mosquito in comparison,
Speaker 1: a being that can be crushed without trace.
Speaker 3: And soon it is not just audio recordings. Melvin the
Speaker 3: middle Man begins building an entire archive of evidence. It
Speaker 3: includes the selfie of himself with the Prime Minister's chief
Speaker 3: of Staff, Keith Skembrie, the two of them ah me
Speaker 3: in ah during that bizarre tour of government offices organized
Speaker 3: by mister alleged Mastermind.
Speaker 1: One taped conversation is particularly revealing. On the tape, mister
Speaker 1: alleged Mastermind describes the moment when he informed Keith Kembri
Speaker 1: that Daphne had been murdered on his alleged Mastermind's personal orders.
Speaker 1: That the whole crime was his plan.
Speaker 9: Keach Cambrie froze, his face became white, eshen white. You
Speaker 9: can hear him saying this to Melvin Tooma on tape
Speaker 9: being secretly taped recorded by Melvin Tooma months after the murder.
Speaker 1: The implication is that Keach Cambrie wasn't in on the
Speaker 1: plan to kill Daphne and wasn't even aware that alleged
Speaker 1: Mastermind was responsible, and so, according to mister alleged Mastermind,
Speaker 1: Keith's reaction to hearing this confession is shocked. Sch Caambree's
Speaker 1: ashen white reaction suggests both his personal lack of involvement,
Speaker 1: but also that he immediately realizes this might be an
Speaker 1: unimaginable disaster for him politically, that he is now complicit
Speaker 1: and the most famous murder in Malta's modern history.
Speaker 3: But if this is the case, keefs Gmbrie does not
Speaker 3: denounce mister Alleged Mastermind. He does not contact Europe's police
Speaker 3: agency europe On. He does not contact the Multi's police
Speaker 3: with this breakthrough in the case. Instead, he pulls himself
Speaker 3: together and continues working with his close friend mister Alleged Mastermind,
Speaker 3: helping him to cover up the crime by allegedly sharing
Speaker 3: confidential details of the investigation. To this day, keeps Gambrie
Speaker 3: has denied any wrongdoing and denies leaking information. But in truth,
Speaker 3: by now it is becoming too late for a successful
Speaker 3: cover up. Never underestimate the mosquito.
Speaker 1: There's another reason why the cover up being ground. Alleged
Speaker 1: mastermind might be unreveling. Just as Daphnese killers are beginning
Speaker 1: to turn on each other, the Deafney Project, the international
Speaker 1: team of journalists who gathered to follow up lose ends
Speaker 1: in her stories, are continuing to.
Speaker 3: Work, searching, above all, for the story that might reveal
Speaker 3: the motive for her murder.
Speaker 1: They get some impressive scoops. We've heard how the Definite
Speaker 1: Project reported on Malta's passport sales scheme, its public hospital scandal,
Speaker 1: and the shady deals with Azerbaijan, but so far still
Speaker 1: nothing that seems linked to Daphne's murder.
Speaker 3: Then Jacob Borche, a Daphney Project reporter for the Terms
Speaker 3: of Malta, gets an intriguing anonymous tip. The tip off
Speaker 3: is to look up one phrase in Daphne's entire journalistic output,
Speaker 3: seventeen Black along with Stephen Gray, a reporter from v
Speaker 3: and it so happens a friend of ours. Jacob begins
Speaker 3: searching through Daphne's archive for every mention.
Speaker 1: The first blog post to mention it is typical Daphne,
Speaker 1: a cryptic, intriguing teaser. The whole post is just one
Speaker 1: sentence long.
Speaker 2: February twenty second, twenty seventeen. Seventeen Black the name of
Speaker 2: a company incorporated in Dubai.
Speaker 1: Underneath that sentence are some photos of politicians the key ones.
Speaker 1: First a picture of the Prime Minister Joseph Moscat, second
Speaker 1: a photo of Chief of Staff Keach Cambri, and finally
Speaker 1: a photo of Health and Energy Minister Conrad Mitzi. And
Speaker 1: that's it. What could be linking these powerful men with
Speaker 1: a Dubai company called seventeen Black. Of course, the last
Speaker 1: two men, she Cambria and Midsi, are the same politicians
Speaker 1: Daphne had already identified in the Panama Papers as owning
Speaker 1: secret shell companies and Panama. And when the Panama paper
Speaker 1: scandal broke, some mysteries had remained unsolved. Schambrie and Midzi's
Speaker 1: carefully hidden Panama companies had all hardly been used. What
Speaker 1: secret assets had these politicians been expecting to receive.
Speaker 3: Most of the other seventeen Black blog posts don't seem
Speaker 3: likely obvious place to finances though.
Speaker 2: February twenty second, twenty seventeen, I have discovered that this
Speaker 2: clique is using a company called seventeen Black, which is
Speaker 2: incorporated in the United Arab Emirates UAE and registered in Dubai,
Speaker 2: to move large sums of money around. The ultimate beneficial
Speaker 2: ownership of seventeen Black is concealed by nominees protected under
Speaker 2: UAE law.
Speaker 1: Quick translation, the ultimate beneficial ownership is concealed means the
Speaker 1: rill owner is a secret.
Speaker 3: In other words, definitely believe that seventeen Black was a
Speaker 3: company acting as yet another tool to hide payments to
Speaker 3: Maltese politicians and powerful men. She also found that the
Speaker 3: Maltese financial authorities had investigated seventeen Black and found there
Speaker 3: was quotes a reasonable suspicion of money laundering and all
Speaker 3: the proceeds of crime on quotes. That is to say,
Speaker 3: it looked pretty dodgy, but no action was taken by
Speaker 3: the police. Dafely also didn't know who was behind seventeen Black.
Speaker 3: She hadn't discovered who, let's say, was the alleged mastermind
Speaker 3: of seventeen Black.
Speaker 1: And gradually the scandal of seventeen Black was overshadowed by
Speaker 1: other scandals, even on Dafnew's on blog at this point
Speaker 1: after her death, it still isn't clear why that anonymous
Speaker 1: tipster had suggested looking into seventeen Black, but the Definitely
Speaker 1: Project reporters aren't about to give up easily.
Speaker 10: A company called seventeen Black was playing in a really
Speaker 10: important role in all of this, but we didn't have
Speaker 10: a lot more and we didn't have proof, and so
Speaker 10: we went back to the data.
Speaker 3: Bassi and Obermayer and the rest of the Daphne Project
Speaker 3: organizers decided to take a fresh approach. They would re
Speaker 3: examine some of the original leak files that had been
Speaker 3: behind the Panama Papers scoop, and in this huge database
Speaker 3: of files they find some leaked emails that hadn't seemed
Speaker 3: important when Daphne was alive.
Speaker 1: In the middle of a haystack, a journalistic needle has appeared.
Speaker 10: We were looking inside that that part of data, and
Speaker 10: we found this email which didn't say a lot, but
Speaker 10: it said that there was a company called seventeen Black
Speaker 10: and that Metro to receive money.
Speaker 1: That leaked email allows the Dafney project to confirm what
Speaker 1: Deafhney had alleged but hadn't been able to prove. It
Speaker 1: suggests that government ministers Conrad Mitzi and Keach Company had
Speaker 1: been expecting to receive had been promised regular large amounts
Speaker 1: of money moving into their Panama holding companies. All from
Speaker 1: seventeen Black.
Speaker 4: Times of Mota eighty eight April twenty and eighty A
Speaker 4: total of one point six million dollars one point three
Speaker 4: million euros was transferred to seventeen Black to the BI
Speaker 4: company listed as one of the target clients which would
Speaker 4: pay in money to Keych Cambrees and Conrad Midsi's once
Speaker 4: secret Panama companies. League to documents show.
Speaker 1: The definitely project breaking this story was huge. Midsi ande
Speaker 1: Cambree deny wrongdoing, proof that in spite of all these denials,
Speaker 1: the emails showed that Maltese politicians had planned to enrich
Speaker 1: themselves secretly while in office, and they were going to
Speaker 1: do so using a company that Maltese investigators considered under
Speaker 1: suspicion for money laundering and criminal activity.
Speaker 10: And so this was the missing piece that helped to
Speaker 10: connect the Panama papers and to the money right, and
Speaker 10: so once we got puzzled that together we had a
Speaker 10: strong lead.
Speaker 3: But there is still one big question unanswered. Around this time,
Speaker 3: a group of demonstrators stage of protests outside government officers
Speaker 3: with placards reading who owns seventeen black?
Speaker 1: Exactly?
Speaker 6: Who?
Speaker 1: Who was planning to bribe these politicians? That question on
Speaker 1: the blucards is the question that everyone in more Thanao
Speaker 1: once answered, everyone.
Speaker 3: Except mister alleged Mastermind. Mister alleged Mastermind can't afford for
Speaker 3: that question to be answered, and he knows that the
Speaker 3: closer the Daphne Project gets to his friend Keith Schenbury,
Speaker 3: the closer they will get to him. Because you won't
Speaker 3: be surprised to hear this, The real owner of seventeen
Speaker 3: Black is our mister alleged Mastermind, and he must know
Speaker 3: it might not be long before his real identity is
Speaker 3: exposed and.
Speaker 1: The Deafnite Project are not his only problem now. Around
Speaker 1: this time too, the spring of twenty eighteen, the Maltese
Speaker 1: police investigation of the Dafnie murder begins to pick up
Speaker 1: the pace, and for the first time, mister Alleged Mastermind
Speaker 1: is mentioned by name. In the police investigation as a
Speaker 1: person of interest, even a potential suspect. For the first time,
Speaker 1: he is on the investigation's radar. For the first time,
Speaker 1: his wealth and power are no longer shielding him. We
Speaker 1: don't know for sure if he finds this out, but
Speaker 1: given how he has a network that has told him
Speaker 1: about every other detail of the investigation, it seems likely
Speaker 1: he knows that the net is slowly closing in around him,
Speaker 1: and so.
Speaker 3: Like Vincent the Cough and Melvin the Middleman before him,
Speaker 3: mister alleged Mastermind begins to crash slowly on the pressure,
Speaker 3: buckling under the stress of avoiding justice. First he turns
Speaker 3: the cocaine his daily use, ballooning as he tries to
Speaker 3: remain in control, and then he begins using tranquilizers to
Speaker 3: calm himself down. Unlike Melvin the Middleman, he has private
Speaker 3: doctors to supply him with as many pills as he
Speaker 3: can take, but the drugs make him unstable, unpredictable, less
Speaker 3: able to keep spinning all the plates.
Speaker 1: Then, around eighteen months later, in November twenty nineteen, it
Speaker 1: happens again. A new Defnite project story is jointly published
Speaker 1: by the Times of Malta and writers and this does
Speaker 1: have all the answers.
Speaker 4: Thousand Mortar ninth November two thouy and nineteen exclusive seventeen
Speaker 4: Black owner identified as local power station businessman. Local criminal
Speaker 4: investigators have been handed an intelligence report aiming the electro
Speaker 4: Gas power station director and businessman as the owner of
Speaker 4: the mystery Dubai company seventeen Black.
Speaker 3: A story that fills in the final blanks that daphnely
Speaker 3: didn't live long enough to complete.
Speaker 1: The Defney project identified the owner of seventeen Black as
Speaker 1: one of Malta's richest entrepreneurs, the owner of luxury hotels,
Speaker 1: casinos and real estate. And most importantly, he is also
Speaker 1: the director of something called Electrogas, a company which built
Speaker 1: and runs a brand new power station for the whole country.
Speaker 1: And here's where the connections get interesting. Joseph mouscat Keach
Speaker 1: Cambri and Conrad Mitzi's government have locked Maltese consumers into
Speaker 1: buying electricity from the Electrogas power station, a decision which
Speaker 1: is making alleged mastermind as director of electro Gas a
Speaker 1: lot of money. Moscat, Mitzi, Schambri. They all said that
Speaker 1: the new power station energy deal was fixed for the
Speaker 1: benefit of the Maltese people and for Malta's future, that's
Speaker 1: what they said. But it's a deal which some analysts
Speaker 1: say costs ordinary Maltese people like me a lot of
Speaker 1: money in increased bills. We are paying a private monopoly,
Speaker 1: as some analysts put it, hand over fist, just to
Speaker 1: turn the lights on. And now The Times of Malta,
Speaker 1: Reuters and the Deafney Project are able to reveal that
Speaker 1: Cambri and MIDSI were also expecting to receive huge private
Speaker 1: payments to their secret Panama companies from the director of
Speaker 1: this same power station company, that they've signed a deal
Speaker 1: with what you might call, if you're being nice, a
Speaker 1: serious conflict of interest when approving the project. Scambri and
Speaker 1: MIDSI still deny all wrongdoing.
Speaker 3: The director of the electro Gas power Station Company is
Speaker 3: the same man we have been calling mister alleged Mastermind
Speaker 3: in this series up till now. He's a man who
Speaker 3: loves to gamble and whose father's lucky number at roulette
Speaker 3: was seventeen black. Not all gamblers turn out to be lucky.
Speaker 3: And this is the same man who in twenty seventeen
Speaker 3: stood to lose everything if Daphne Carojuana Galicia lived long
Speaker 3: enough to complete her investigation of seventeen Black and connected
Speaker 3: him and his projects to Malta's corruption scandals, and in
Speaker 3: fact she became remarkably close to exposing the truth.
Speaker 1: We now know that a whistleblower had passed Daphne a
Speaker 1: huge strove of league documents from within Electrogas, documents that
Speaker 1: had the potential to reveal the full extent of the
Speaker 1: corruption involved in the company's dealings with government and the
Speaker 1: poor value it was actually offering the Maltese people. Daphnie
Speaker 1: was working on this strove with her son Metew when
Speaker 1: she was killed, and she never published her findings, but
Speaker 1: there were hints in her blog posts that she was
Speaker 1: close to the truth. Buried deep in the comment section
Speaker 1: to that first mysterious seventeen Black blog post by Daphne
Speaker 1: is a short conversation between two of Daphne's readers. This
Speaker 1: was normal, The comment section was always lively on Dafany's blog.
Speaker 1: Today we can't know everything that was said because one
Speaker 1: of the commentators has since deleted his or her remarks, wisely,
Speaker 1: perhaps for their own safety. But Deaphne was intrigued by
Speaker 1: what the commenters had written about her post, and decided
Speaker 1: to reply herself, thanking them for a useful idea. Her
Speaker 1: reply marks what I believe to be the only time
Speaker 1: she mentioned mister alleged Mastermind by name, and she connects
Speaker 1: him with what she sarcastically calls Malta's magic New corruption
Speaker 1: power station. Is just two sentences long, but it's all there.
Speaker 1: Alleged mastermind's real name and an accusation of corruption involving
Speaker 1: the electro Gas.
Speaker 2: Power station, a couple of the owners of their magic
Speaker 2: new corruption power station, and it's Jorgan Fenek. So thanks
Speaker 2: for this, because it really figures.
Speaker 3: His name is Jorgen Fenek, director of Electra Gas, owner
Speaker 3: of seventeen Black, and the alleged mastermind of Japhne's murder.
Speaker 1: Her decision to include that name in this comment, probably
Speaker 1: written without a second thought, might be what signed her
Speaker 1: death warrant. It's just a few weeks later that prosecutors
Speaker 1: believe Jorgan Fennec, mister alleged Mastermind, orders her assassination. But
Speaker 1: even as he becomes an official suspect in Daphne's murder,
Speaker 1: mister Fennec still has a few more roles of the
Speaker 1: dice to play. That's Next. Crooks Everywhere is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeart Podcasts, Topic Studios and Vespucci. It's reported and
Speaker 1: hosted by me Manuel Delia and John Sweeney. The senior
Speaker 1: producer is Leo Hornack. The producer is Maddie Hickish krish
Speaker 1: Denesh Kumar is the assistant producer. The story editors are
Speaker 1: Emma Federill, Matt Willis, and Philippa Geering. The managing producers
Speaker 1: are Thomas Curry and Rachel Byrne. The voice of daf
Speaker 1: Nick Rwana Galizia is played by Ciena Miller, acting direction
Speaker 1: by Christopher Houten Maltese voices by Mikhaiel basma Jan and
Speaker 1: Pierre staff Rach. The executive producers are Johnny Galvin and
Speaker 1: Daniel Turkean at Vespucci, Christi Gressman at Topic Studios, Katina
Speaker 1: Norvell and Niki Etoor at iHeart Podcasts, and Ciena Miller
Speaker 1: Marketing lead as David Wassermann. Audio recording by Tom Berry
Speaker 1: at Wardoor Studios. Audio mix and sound design by Joel Cox.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Andrew Watchcardona, Alessandra di Crespo, Eddie Isles,
Speaker 1: and Andrew Carvana Galizia,