According to Newsbook, he is expected before Magistrate Nadia Vella at about 3pm. An arraignment is only the state’s opening act in a criminal case, but in a killing this violent it is also the moment when accusation stops being a police account and enters the court record.
Police were called after reports of a wounded man and found Ġanni Cassar with a wound to his chest, Newsbook reported. Inside the house, officers found Mary Grace Cassar, who is believed to have been killed by blows from a screwdriver.
Newsbook said Cassar was arrested about two hours after the killing and was being held in hospital because he was allegedly under the influence of drugs. His interrogation had to be conducted on Friday. Newsbook, citing the Times, reported that he was under the influence of a mixture of cocaine, crack and heroin.
In the hours before the killing, and while he was being sought, Newsbook reported that Cassar posted a number of messages on Facebook mentioning his mother, other relatives and a foreign woman he said owed him €7,000. The same report said he fled and locked himself in a property he owns in Ħal Farruġ, where he had written on Facebook that he was armed, before later giving himself up to police.
Newsbook also noted that John Cassar is the brother of Roderick Cassar, who was found guilty of the murder of his ex-wife Bernice Cilia in 2022.
Isla Camilleri