ROME – After five years, two months and 19 days in prison and 50 million euros, Yorgen Fen, the man accused of paying 150,000 euros to have Maltese journalist and blogger, Daphne Caruana Galizia killed, was released from prison. 

 Caruana Galizia was a journalist who focussed on corruption in Malta in particular, her most famous work was on the Panama Papers in 2016.

 She was killed by a car bomb in October 2017 aged 53. 

 Malta Today reported that the alleged murderer left the Corradino Correctional Facility on bail and immediately got into a black van without making statements to journalists who waited outside.

 Fenech is a Maltese businessman, whose main interests are in Hotels and Casinos in Malta, he is accused of murder, corruption, bribing members of the Maltese government, money laundering, the illicit purchase of firearms and poison, as well as arranging the murder of Caruana Galizia. 

 He was also the head of the Tumas Group and a Director of the Maltese-Azerbajan-German company ElectroGas Malta. 

 Her son Matthew Caruana Galizia, shortly before the release of Fenech wrote on social media, "I was just informed that Yorgen Fenech will be released within an hour. 

 The prime minister had 5 years to repair our system and did nothing. 

 Nobody should wait for so long for a legal proceeding.  We do not expect a special treatment: this is an important problem that concerns everyone.”

 Over the years Fenech had submitted several requests for release on bail and all were denied. 

 His last request, in January, was instead accepted on Jan. 24, and the Court established a bond of 80,000 euros to obtain his temporary freedom on bail, with his aunt Moira Fenech acting as a guarantor.

 The Independent Malta specified that the Court ordered Fenech not to stray more than 50 meters from the coast or the airport, to sign every day at the Police station in St Julian and to stay at home between 17 and 11 of the morning. 

 He will also be assigned a surveillance agent and will have to live only at the address provided to the Court. 

 A police officer will stay outside the house at all hours and the court has also retained his passport and identity documents.

 He was also ordered not to communicate or approach the accusation witnesses, including the mediator Melvin Theuma, who was pardoned for other unrelated crimes, and the former head of the staff of the Prime Minister’s Office, Keith Schembri.

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