Magistrate Stops Cat Café Outburst

A court hearing over the Cat Café run at St Vincent de Paul was interrupted when the accused, Karmen Coleiro, shouted at a witness and was ordered by the presiding magistrate to apologise.

Newsbook reported that Coleiro interrupted the testimony of animal rights activist Romina Frendo, telling her she should be ashamed and calling her a liar. Magistrate Giannella Caruana Busuttil reminded Coleiro that she was represented by a lawyer who could speak for her, then instructed her to apologise.

That was the clearest exercise of authority in the courtroom: not a ruling on the case, but a basic one on how it would be heard.

The hearing was part of the compilation of evidence tied to the running of the cat sanctuary at the residence. Frendo told the court she had initially understood the project as one intended to care for cats at St Vincent de Paul and said she had helped look for an alternative site for a large number of animals while serving on the Animal Welfare Council.

Her testimony then turned to what she said volunteers and others had reported to her about conditions at the facility. According to Newsbook’s report, Frendo described allegations of accumulated cat waste, lack of food and maggots in parts of the site. She also presented written accounts from people she said had direct experience with Coleiro, including one from a person who worked at the residence and helped care for the cats, describing animals becoming frantic for food when someone approached.

Among the allegations cited in court was that a mother cat was kept in a cage for about three months in the sun, surrounded by flies, until it died. Frendo also alleged that cats were left in dirty conditions for up to 24 hours and that Animal Welfare Directorate inspections at times found the facility closed.

Those are serious claims. At this stage, they remain claims given in evidence, not findings by the court.

Frendo also told the court that a couple who had left about 20 cats in Coleiro’s care later asked for them back after hearing allegations about conditions, and that the animals were not returned.

The broader dispute is not new. Newsbook said it escalated between late 2023 and early 2024 over the management of the sanctuary, which housed about 270 cats. Management at St Vincent de Paul and the Animal Welfare Directorate then took control after concerns about the animals’ condition. Coleiro and her organisation, Animal Guardians Malta, have denied allegations of uncleanliness and mistreatment.

That matters because a courtroom outburst can distract from the narrower question the court is dealing with: what can actually be supported in evidence. The witness account added more allegations to a case already loaded with them. The magistrate’s intervention did not resolve any of that. It did something more modest and more necessary first — it kept the hearing from turning into an argument from the dock.