STUBBINGS and SCHEMBRI Disgraced cops who tortured people under arrest in the 1980s awarded security contracts

Karl Schembri
Two disgraced police officers who were sacked in 1989 for viciously torturing people under arrest and subjecting them to inhumane treatment are running the local warden services in at least 14 localities.
Former Police Inspectors David Stubbings and Noel Schembri are behind Sterling Security – a company registered in their respective relatives’ names but effectively run by them.
The company has also been offering security services at the law courts until last year, where they were meant to screen all people entering the court building.
Stubbings and Schembri were found guilty, together with other police officers, of torturing three brothers – Joseph Mary, George and Francis Vella – in connection with the alleged weapons held at the PN headquarters, and forcing them to sign police statements in November 1983.
The Vellas were arrested in November 1983 and tortured by Schembri and Stubbings, among others.
The Constitutional Court had heard how the Vellas were “tortured mercilessly and relentlessly for hours” by the inspectors. They were “kicked, punched, and beaten up with chairs, wooden pieces, and a whip”, and even had bucketfuls of urine thrown onto them while in the police lockup.
Francis Vella ended up with a dislocated shoulder and fractured ribs. He was so badly injured that the police themselves had to take him to hospital after hours left in agony and pain.
The Vellas had recounted how they were continuously and violently threatened to release statements to the police and confess to criminal activities.
And yet, Sterling Security boasts on its website that its personnel are “required to undergo a selection and vetting procedure to ensure that each individual has a verifiable employment record and that he can be relied upon to meet the highest standards of service”.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice and Home Affairs confirmed that Stubbings’ and Schembri’s security firm had won the tender for security at the Law Courts twice, after submitting the cheapest bids on both occasions.
They were engaged for the periods between the 29 May 2006 and 6 June 2007, and subsequently between the 7 June 2007 and the 30 June 2008.
Set up just four years since they were sacked from the police, Sterling Security is registered under Helen Antonia Schembri and Miriam Stubbings. However, the two convicted human rights abusers work as administrators and were directly involved to secure the court security tender in 2006.
According to the company’s website, the convicted torturers provide warden services in Zejtun, Tarxien, Santa Lucia, Paola, Marsaxlokk, Ghaxaq, Gudja, Birezebbuga, Safi, Mqabba, Qrendi, Luqa, Kirkop and Zurrieq.
Last August, they also secured a tender from the Office of the Prime Minister to provide security services at the ex-Computer Centre premises in Dingli.
This is not the only case in which disgraced police officers from the 1980s end up in charge of security tenders under Nationalist administrations.
The former assistant commissioner indicted on human rights breaches and frame-ups, Joe Psaila, is head of Group 4 security at Mater Dei. Psaila was in fact promoted to assistant commissioner by the Nationalist administration after the change in government in 1987.
Psaila was one of the police superintendents found guilty of physically assaulting Anthony Mifsud under interrogation, over framed accusations concerning the prison break of Louis Bartolo and a Palestinian terrorist. Psaila has been ordered to pay damages to Mifsud.
He was also ordered to pay Lm34,000 in compensation to Martin Gaffarena, for illegally procuring his fingerprints from a glass he had drank from, which were later placed on a bomb. Gaffarena spent three years in preventive custody throughout his trial by jury.

kschembri@mediatoday.com.mt

 

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