Stivala case collapses on police errors

Michael Stivala was acquitted on charges linked to the use of his late father’s disabled parking badge after a court found the prosecution had not proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.

According to Newsbook, Magistrate Yana Micallef Stafrace dismissed the charges after identifying a string of gaps in the police investigation. Stivala, president of the Malta Development Association and head of the Stivala Group, had been charged with using an unauthorised Blue Badge and with failing to report to the Gżira police station when instructed. He pleaded not guilty.

The court’s criticism was procedural but decisive. Police did not call the LESA officer who reported the vehicle. They did not exhibit the badge itself as evidence. They also filed an affidavit referring to a “Jason” without giving a surname or explaining who that person was. That is not a technicality dressed up as one. It is a prosecution arriving in court without some of the pieces needed to identify what happened and who can say so.

Newsbook reported that the case stemmed from an incident in September 2025, when a LESA official flagged a car registered to Stivala with an expired badge. The badge had belonged to Stivala’s father, Carmelo, who died in 2020, and had expired in 2023. The Commission for the Rights of Persons with Disability had sent letters in July 2020 and September 2025 requesting its return, but received no reply.

Stivala said the vehicle had been used by a company employee, that he had not misused the badge and that he had not received the letters requesting its return. He also said the badge has since been returned and that he had no personal need for one.

An acquittal is not a finding that the badge was properly used. It is a finding that the state did not prove unlawful use to the criminal standard. That distinction matters, especially when the failures were not obscure points of law but missing witnesses, missing exhibits and unexplained paperwork.

Newsbook also noted that Stivala was cleared in 2025 of an excessive-noise charge after police failed to summon the licensing authority in that case.