This is the translation from the court records of the prosecution witness Inspector Paul Caruana. Inspector Raymond Cremona cross-examined the witness on behalf of the prosecution.It is evident that his evidence is unreliable and a confirmation of the amateurish way senior police officers conduct their duty.
Magistrates Court
Magistrate Dr. N. Cuschieri
To day 2nd December 1999
Police Inspector Raymond Cremona
Vs
Joseph Ellul Grech
Inspector Paul Caruana,
Son of the late John.
Born in Pieta’ and stationed at IT Services,
In Maltese and under oath in the presence of the defendant.
Prosecution: Can you tell us what happened on the 15th November of this year?
Magistrate Dr. N. Cuschieri
To day 2nd December 1999
Police Inspector Raymond Cremona
Vs
Joseph Ellul Grech
Inspector Paul Caruana,
Son of the late John.
Born in Pieta’ and stationed at IT Services,
In Maltese and under oath in the presence of the defendant.
Prosecution: Can you tell us what happened on the 15th November of this year?
P. Caruana: I was asked to assist our Crime unit, I was shown three documents and I was asked to go with them and conduct a search in a residence and if a computer was found I was to conduct a search in the computer. We went to a residence in Fgura that belongs to Mr. Ellul Grech who I am recognizing here. As we went into his residence in his room we found a computer in the middle of the room. Meaning he had the monitor, keyboard, mouse and other accessories on a table while the computer was in the middle of the room. I asked the assistance of Mr. Ellul Grech so that we could connect the computer so that we will be able to see what was in the computer and he said that the computer was not working.
When I asked him why it was not working, first he said that it was damaged then he said that he had changed the hard drive and I asked him where he had repaired it and he said that he did not know who the person was. After he told me he had a computer virus but eventually we got it to work. I did a search to see if I could find any documents I was shown and I did not find any of the documents I was shown and I did not find any documents on the computer or the diskettes that were available at the time.
After I finished the search on the computer there was a file next to it and in it there a document similar to one of the documents I was shown earlier. I passed this document to Mr. Cassar who was present at the time of the search and Mr. Cassar showed it to Mr. Ellul Grech, after a while Mr. Ellul Grech presented him with more documents similar to this document. We seized the computer hardware and took them with us to the Police Depot when the next morning these were passed on to the court expert.
Magistrate: The court is showing me doc RC3 to doc RC18.
Magistrate: See if you can recognise any of these documents, if you do tell us what you know.
Magistrate: See if you can recognise any of these documents, if you do tell us what you know.
P.Caruana: This document that I am seeing RC7, where there is doc Y, Midland Bank Trust Corporation; this is the document I first referred to. It was with a bunch of paper and this was similar to that document that I was shown prior to being asked to conduct a search on the computer. These documents that are marked RC3, RC4, and RC5 are documents that Mr. Ellul Grech had given us after we showed him this document. These were in a file not loose. Document RC17 and the three pages that form part of this document were shown to me and I was asked to look for similar documents but I did not find any of them. The computer was completely blank, not one document was in it. Meaning that none of these documents were there.
Prosecution: On the same day where you present during the statement?
Prosecution: On the same day where you present during the statement?
P. Caruana: Yes I was there most of the time when the statement took place on the day we did the search at Mr. Ellul Grech but I did sign it because I was not there some of the time. There was a technical question that I asked him. The court is showing document RC1. At the bottom of this page of this statement I can recognise this question, when I mentioned about the virus on the hard drive. The question here was “When we arrived at your residence you told us that the hard drive had a virus and after you told us that you had it fixed by some person but you did not tell us who the person was”. After you told us it was two or three days since you fixed it. It resulted that the registration was that of September, October 1999, this means that you are lying.” Recently I had many problems with my computer I am being informed that contrary to what I said a virus could not enter the system because there was no external access.” Reply “The computer does not work properly”.
(Most that was written on this statement was concocted by inspector Raymond Cremona while the defendant was under the influence of strong painkillers and under duress. During questioning the defendant always protested his innocence and accused John Dalli of being involved in the sending of the letters. The witness confirmed that the police did not find anything on the computer. These amateurs should have known that at that time a virus could be introduced into a system by transferring data from a diskette or cd).
Prosecution: Mr. Caruana, can you tell us if during parts of this statement for which you were present if the defendant was offered any food and drink?
P. Caruana: Yes. He was offered bread and tea, in fact I also offered him to.
Cross-examination
Defence: Meaning as you have just said, you made a question to Mr. Ellul Grech, asking him what he had done with the old hard drive and his reply was that he kicked it about and jumped on it. Did you ask why he did so?
P. Caruana: I asked when we were at his home and when the statement was being taken, he had three thesis why, it was damaged, he had a virus, it was causing him problems and another one was corrupted files. He also had some thesis about its repair, one was that he repaired it, another that he took it to a technician and when I asked him why he had jumped on it he said because it made him mad.
Defence: Did you ask him what he had done with it after he had jumped on it?
P. Caruana: I did, he replied that he did not know.
Defence: In a statement here you came to the conclusion that it was not a virus because there was no external access to data from outside the computer?
P. Caruana: Yes, because as I had told him, he did not have access to the internet, he did not have external access to diskettes, viruses come from a network or from diskettes.
Defence: Which type of qualifications in IT do you have?
P. Caruana: I have been in the police corps for ten years in IT, I built a network for the police corps, I worked on machines that run on Unix, I was also involved in many investigations where computers are concerned.
Magistrate: Do you have academic qualifications?
P. Caruana: DPM, however I did not continue to the final the reason being that there was a moment of opportunity in the police where I had to choose, I either had to continue with my studies or had to lose the opportunity in the police force.
Defence: What is DPM?
P. Caruana: Diploma in Data Processing Management.
Cross-examination reserved.
This is the substance of the witness Inspector Paul Caruana as dictated by him.
I declare that I transcribed faithfully, honestly and according to the transcript witness tape.
Ivan Ghio.
Transcriber
P. Caruana: Yes. He was offered bread and tea, in fact I also offered him to.
Cross-examination
Defence: Meaning as you have just said, you made a question to Mr. Ellul Grech, asking him what he had done with the old hard drive and his reply was that he kicked it about and jumped on it. Did you ask why he did so?
P. Caruana: I asked when we were at his home and when the statement was being taken, he had three thesis why, it was damaged, he had a virus, it was causing him problems and another one was corrupted files. He also had some thesis about its repair, one was that he repaired it, another that he took it to a technician and when I asked him why he had jumped on it he said because it made him mad.
Defence: Did you ask him what he had done with it after he had jumped on it?
P. Caruana: I did, he replied that he did not know.
Defence: In a statement here you came to the conclusion that it was not a virus because there was no external access to data from outside the computer?
P. Caruana: Yes, because as I had told him, he did not have access to the internet, he did not have external access to diskettes, viruses come from a network or from diskettes.
Defence: Which type of qualifications in IT do you have?
P. Caruana: I have been in the police corps for ten years in IT, I built a network for the police corps, I worked on machines that run on Unix, I was also involved in many investigations where computers are concerned.
Magistrate: Do you have academic qualifications?
P. Caruana: DPM, however I did not continue to the final the reason being that there was a moment of opportunity in the police where I had to choose, I either had to continue with my studies or had to lose the opportunity in the police force.
Defence: What is DPM?
P. Caruana: Diploma in Data Processing Management.
Cross-examination reserved.
This is the substance of the witness Inspector Paul Caruana as dictated by him.
I declare that I transcribed faithfully, honestly and according to the transcript witness tape.
Ivan Ghio.
Transcriber
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| Inspector Paul Caruana - His Unreliable Witness P1 |
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| Inspector Paul Caruana - His Unreliable Witness P2 |
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| Inspector Paul Caruana - His Unreliable Witness P3 |
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