Malta Extradition

[agilis]

Sure-if there are to be both criminal and civil charges. What I am talking about is prosecutors making criminal charges for incidents that are not normally considered to be criminal.

For example, a couple of years ago in Ferguson, Missouri, the home of a recent bigger incident, a man was brought into jail at night in a case of mistaken identify. Realizing the mistake but not wanting to go to the trouble of taking him home at night, they ordered him to spend the night, sharing a one person cell with another person. He protested, and four police officers went into the cell to convince him to stop protesting. After that, the pressed criminal charges for destruction of government property. What had he done? He had bled on their uniforms during the "conversation."

Under normal circumstances, bleeding on the uniforms of the police officers who are beating you is not considered a criminal offense, but in this case it was.

I recall a case involving a group of police officers who broke down the door, terrorized, and arrested the inhabitants of a house. It was the wrong address. The innocent family described the police involved as incompetent morons. The police officers sued the family for malicious statements, and the costs of defending themselves bankrupted that family.

In connection with the issue of people with instructor certifications being held liable for accidents even when they are simply customers on vacation, my philosophy is that it is foolish to have official certifications beyond those required to dive, unless these certifications are going to be used professionally.

By all means go through the training programs that interest you, but unless you plan to actually use the certification that accompanies the training simply refuse to pay for and obtain the card. Do not complete that last step. You will have the skills you want without the official classification and the legal entanglements it may involve. If this does not fit with your personal ego requirements, try growing up.

 

[Lopez116]

John,

I'll try to explain this again. It may not be the case in every country in the EU but in many there is *always* a criminal hearing before any civil case can proceed.

What I'm saying is that if someone wants to sue for damages or liability that the courts here -- almost ALWAYS -- hold a criminal hearing first. I assume that the idea is that if someone is claiming liability that it's important to FIRST determine if an actual crime has been committed.

Only after the courts decide that an actual crime has not been committed is it possible to pursue a civil case.

I think in the United States it may be possible to "sue" someone in civil court without it triggering a criminal investigation and/or proceeding but in Europe, as far as I know, this isn't possible. That may be one of the reasons why Americans sue each other over spilled milk and Europeans do not.... and cannot.

That said, I'm not a lawyer so if I'm wrong about this then I hope to be corrected.

R..

In the U.S., there is definitely no requirement that a criminal prosecution occur before a civil suit. You can have either or both. As a practical matter, if there is a criminal conviction, the civil case is a slam dunk. But, you can also have an acquittal in the criminal case and a finding of liability in the civil case (I.e. OJ Simpson).

 

[scagrotto]

In your teacher example, if that happened in CA (and the defendant was acquitted), the employer would be required to indemnify the employee of the employee was acting within the course and scope of his employment when the incident occurred.

AFAIK, that's pretty standard throughout the US. If something you do as part of a government job (not sure about the private sector) isn't a crime based on an acquittal then the employer covers the cost of your defense. There will be some exceptions, but an acquittal generally means you were acting properly and within the scope of your job. The problem is that being found guilty doesn't always mean that you really are guilty. The OP's predicament is a great example. Based on the facts presented to us, I don't think anybody here actually thinks a crime was committed. That doesn't mean that the OP won't be convicted.

Only after the courts decide that an actual crime has not been committed is it possible to pursue a civil case.

Let me make sure I understand this correctly. Let's imagine I'm visiting your house, and your dog jumps up on me and causes me to fall down the stairs and break my arm. Before I can file a civil case to be compensated for my injuries the police have to conduct a criminal investigation that involves the courts to make sure a crime wasn't committed? And what if a crime was committed? Suppose you push me down the stairs on purpose and the police investigation determines that there was in fact a crime. Does the fact that a crime was committed mean I can't file a civil suit?

With the first scenario I've got no problem with the idea of a cursory investigation to be sure it was an accident (especially if the fall kills me and I can't tell my side of the story). The idea that the scenario with just a broken arm requires anything more than a 60 second conversation wherein I say it was clearly an accident strikes me as thoroughly ridiculous.

 

[Frosty]

hey scagrotto over here we have something called ACC. All medical bills for accidents are paid for by them and after the first week you also get 80% of your income paid by them. Its paid by your taxes

 

[Diver0001]

Let me make sure I understand this correctly. Let's imagine I'm visiting your house, and your dog jumps up on me and causes me to fall down the stairs and break my arm. Before I can file a civil case to be compensated for my injuries the police have to conduct a criminal investigation that involves the courts to make sure a crime wasn't committed? And what if a crime was committed? Suppose you push me down the stairs on purpose and the police investigation determines that there was in fact a crime. Does the fact that a crime was committed mean I can't file a civil suit?

I need to preface this by stating that I am not a lawyer.

My experience is limited to cases I've been involved with. What I've been told is that this general process is applied throughout Europe. This is also my experience. It must first be established that no CRIME has been committed before lawyers are allowed to squabble about money.

R..

 

[scagrotto]

hey scagrotto over here we have something called ACC. All medical bills for accidents are paid for by them and after the first week you also get 80% of your income paid by them. Its paid by your taxes

We've got something a bit similar here, called no-fault insurance, but it only applies to auto accidents and doesn't affect liability for damages other than medical bills and lost income. What we also have, but I gather you don't, is the ability to be compensated for other financial losses that are incidental to the injury and what are referred to as "non-economic injuries". If you've grown up being used to your system maybe you're okay with the idea that if a drunken motorist cripples you and you never walk again that having your medical bills and lost income paid makes everything okay. Having grown up under a different system I've got this crazy idea that if I lose the ability to walk I've lost more than the resulting medical bills and loss of income, and that the person who caused the damage is responsible for compensating me.

We also don't need to wait for a police investigation, because compensation is based on fault (and the injury, of course) rather than whether the injuries were caused by accident or a deliberate action, though deliberate action may result in increased compensation. The OJ Simpson case mentioned earlier is an example. The jury would probably have awarded much less compensation if he had killed his ex-wife accidentally, but because they believed he murdered her they awarded a fairly sizable amount.

 

[Phil_C]

John,

I'll try to explain this again. It may not be the case in every country in the EU but in many there is *always* a criminal hearing before any civil case can proceed.

What I'm saying is that if someone wants to sue for damages or liability that the courts here -- almost ALWAYS -- hold a criminal hearing first. I assume that the idea is that if someone is claiming liability that it's important to FIRST determine if an actual crime has been committed.

Only after the courts decide that an actual crime has not been committed is it possible to pursue a civil case.

I think in the United States it may be possible to "sue" someone in civil court without it triggering a criminal investigation and/or proceeding but in Europe, as far as I know, this isn't possible. That may be one of the reasons why Americans sue each other over spilled milk and Europeans do not.... and cannot.

That said, I'm not a lawyer so if I'm wrong about this then I hope to be corrected.

R..

Hi Diver0001, - Sorry to correct you but you are wrong - in most EU countries civil and criminal law are completely separate and proceed independently of each other.

Normally they are heard in in different court sessions, and before a different set of judges, and frequently in different buildings to criminal hearings. I can say this with confidence because I have spent 30 years as an officer in the UK Police, and that is certainly the case there. Ten of those years I spent working with Interpol in probably 15 or 16 other countries, mainly within Europe, but also Africa and the middle east, and again in my experience of those other countries civil and criminal cases are separate.

It is possible to take a civil case without any police investigation or involvement, just hire a lawyer and sue !, likewise it is possible for a criminal case to be heard without a civil case, and the criminal court can award compensation (just usually not as much as in a civil court).

In most EU countries if there is a criminal charge, and also a civil claim for compensation arising from the same incident, the civil case is held in abeyance until the outcome of the criminal case is decided. The reason for this is that the burden of proof in most courts is lower for civil liability, so if you are convicted or criminal liability, the civil liability usually follows, but not vice a versa. Also rules of evidence are different between civil and criminal cases, so there is evidence (often speculation) that can be heard in a civil case but that cannot be tendered before a criminal court, and could prejudice a fair trial, so the civil case is delayed so it does not prejudice the criminal one.

Criminal Liability tends to be "beyond all reasonable doubt", whereas civil liability tends to be "on the balance of probability"- which translates as it is more likely than not.

In my experience it is also uncommon for an EU country insurance policies to cover criminal liability, most policies will provide cover for civil liability for negligence or accident, and pay damages and costs associated with a civil case, but most will not cover criminal liability. But then in most EU countries you do not have the double jeopardy of an equivalent civil and criminal charge. A crime consists of two parts - mens reas (mental intent) and actus reas (the physical act) and both aspect shave to be proved to be guilty of a crime. For civil liability often it is just necessary to prove someone did the act that led to harm or loss, without any intent. A civil liability to compensate for your own actions is then inferred.

In this case for some reason the Maltese authorities have for some reason decided they think Stephen is criminally liable - without access to the evidence and the file I have no idea why, although it does seem a perverse decision on the information given. Once that happened BSAC's hands were tied, the insurance did not cover criminal charges, and also legal advice to BSACs executive would have said to make no comment that could be prejudicial to Stephens case or BSAC's own liability, which frequently gets shortened to "make no comment".

On one of the teams I work with now I have very senior Maltese official who knows a fair bit about Maltese law, and is as perplexed as I am about this and seems to think there is a bit of backside covering going on caused by fear for the effect on the tourist industry of several diving deaths over short period of time, but I must say he is not involved in any way, and has no direct knowledge of this case as he is involved in a different field.

Good luck to Stephen, unfortunately though I think this will have to run its course. - Phil.

 

[brnt999]

http://www.theguardian.com/law/2016...dition-malta-scuba-dive-deaths-stephen-martin

 

[Ken Kurtis]

Discussion from 2015 (when the news broke) about this over here: http://www.scubaboard.com/community...ghter-from-discover-scuba-death-malta.471298/

 

[clownfishsydney]

This is shades of the Gabe and Tina Watson case. From what I have read (and I only just learnt of this), he has no case to answer at all as he seems to have done everything possible at the time.