Constitutional Court overturns human rights violation judgment

A judgement which had found that a man charged with drug trafficking had suffered a violation of his fundamental human rights has been overturned by the Constitutional Court. The Civil Court had found in 2010 that Charles Muscat, known as il-Pips, had his fundamental human rights violated when he released a statement to the police while not assisted by a lawyer. Mr Muscat is charged with trafficking in heroin and cocaine. He made his statement to the police in 2002 when he had already been in prison on other charges since 1994. In 2010, he claimed before the court that he had not been assisted by a lawyer because in 2002 there was no right at law for an accused person to be assisted by a lawyer.  He claimed that this was a violation of his fundamental human right to a fair hearing and requested the court to grant him a remedy. In October 2011 the first court upheld Mr Muscat's claim and the Attorney General, on behalf of the government, appealed to the Constitutional Court composed of Acting Chief Justice Giannino Caruana Demajo, Mr Justice Noel Cuschieri and Mr Justice Joseph Zammit McKeon. On appeal, the Constitutional Court declared that the fundamental human right protected...