John Smith
A man convicted of importing explosives and trying to buy lethal poisons over the darkweb is missing.
Sources told Times of Malta that Jomic Calleja Maatouk, 36, has failed to sign a bail book for a number of days and is now considered a wanted man.
His partner has also been reported missing, with family members telling authorities they have not heard from her in several days.
Law enforcement officers suspect the two may have fled the country, sources said. Times of Malta could not establish whether local authorities have alerted Interpol about the missing pair, or started work to issue a European Arrest Warrant for the convicted man.
Calleja Maatouk was sentenced to five years in prison in July after a magistrate concluded that he was guilty of importing explosives, document forgery, using that forged document, breaching previous bail conditions and relapsing.
A court heard evidence of how Calleja Maatouk had tried to buy lethal doses of radioactive material Polonium-210, highly toxic poison Ricin, killer drug Fentanyl and C-4 explosive off a darkweb marketplace.
He told the seller that he needed “five doses” of the poisonous substances and would need more in the future.
C-4 explosive was sent to an address in the UK, but intercepted by US law enforcement and replaced with a dummy package which eventually made its way to Calleja Maatouk in Malta.
When sentencing him, Magistrate Donatella Frendo Dimech described Calleja Maatouk as “a lethal weapon” who was ready to open “the gates of hell upon whoever he deemed an inconvenience to be eliminated.”
But a quirk in Malta’s judicial system meant that the “lethal weapon” was allowed out of custody after being convicted.
According to Maltese law, individuals who are found guilty of a crime and sentenced to prison time by a magistrate’s court are allowed out of custody if they appeal that decision, pending the final outcome of those proceedings.
That does not apply to people tried by a criminal court, which is led by a judge. In those cases, a person convicted of a crime remains in custody until the appeal is decided.
Calleja Maatouk’s case was assigned to a magistrate’s court, and he was therefore a free man once he filed an appeal against his conviction, given that he was out on bail prior to his conviction.
The wanted man has a long criminal record – as well as a history of fleeing the long arm of the law.
In 2015, a then-29-year-old Calleja Maatouk was arrested aboard a train in Sicily that was heading to the Italian mainland, having left Malta as he faced criminal proceedings related to cannabis trafficking.
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