Malta trial of Yorgen Fenech reveals text about celebrating journalist's murder

Yorgen Fenech, a 44‑year‑old heir to a Maltese property empire that includes several Hilton hotels, is on trial in Malta for complicity in the 2017 car‑bomb murder of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. The prosecution’s key witness, protected taxi driver Melvin Theuma, testified that Fenech instructed him to contact a known criminal and organise the killing to protect his uncle, Raymond Fenech, the head of the family business. Theuma said Fenech later sent a text from his boat saying he was “preparing champagne” to celebrate the murder.

The witness described a payment of €150,000 to three men – George and Alfred Degiorgio and Vincent Muscat – and detailed how the assassins used a dockside “potato warehouse” as a base. Recordings of conversations between Fenech and the hitmen have been submitted as evidence. The trial follows the 2017 bombing that killed Caruana Galizia after she published revelations about senior Maltese politicians, an event that triggered a snap general election.