Malta Court Blocks FBI Evidence in Daniel Meli Hacking Extradition Drama

Valletta’s courtroom number four was packed tighter than a festa pyrotechnics van yesterday when magistrate Rachel Montebello threw out freshly-arrived evidence from the FBI, ruling that the 2 000-page digital dossier landed too late to be fairly examined by 24-year-old Daniel Meli and his three co-accused. The decision is the latest twist in Malta’s first-ever extradition battle involving alleged trans-Atlantic cyber-crime, and it has split opinion from Sliema gaming offices to University lecture halls.

Meli, a former St Aloysius College student who once won a national robotics prize, is wanted by Washington for allegedly developing and selling the “Warzone RAT” – a sneaky piece of software that American investigators say infected thousands of computers, including hospital machines during the 2020 pandemic. US prosecutors claim the Maltese coder pocketed more than €500 000 in Bitcoin between 2018 and 2022, while buyers logged in from 40 countries to spy on webcams, empty crypto-wallets and even blackmail victims.

Defence lawyer Stefano Filletti argued that the new material – server logs, cryptocurrency tracing charts and witness statements collected after the original US indictment – “ambushes the accused” three weeks before the extradition hearing. “In Malta we still believe in the presumption of innocence, not trial by Dropbox,” Filletti told the court, earning murmurs of approval from Meli’s parents seated behind him. The magistrate agreed, citing Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights and ordering that only evidence submitted within the legal time-limit will be admissible when the case resumes on 17 July.

Outside the neo-classical courthouse, Meli’s mother clutched a rosary and thanked “the Maltese courts for protecting my son’s rights”. Yet the ruling triggered sharp reactions across the island. “If America says he’s a cyber-terrorist, we should listen,” commented Edward Zarb, CEO of a Birkirkara IT security firm. “Our reputation as a trustworthy tech hub is on the line.” Others saw national pride at stake. “We’re always told we’re too small to fight the big boys,” said sociology student Maria Cassar. “Today the court proved our judiciary isn’t Washington’s rubber stamp.”

The case has reopened a decades-old local debate about extradition treaties. Malta signed its agreement with the United States in 2005, but only two people – both accused of drug trafficking – have ever been sent across the Atlantic. Legal observers note that Meli’s predicament lands just as Malta negotiates a US Double-Taxation Treaty aimed at attracting American i-Gaming operators. “Courts here are hyper-aware of geopolitical optics,” remarked Dr Paolo Mifsud, who teaches criminal procedure at the University of Malta. “Rejecting late evidence is a discreet way of saying: we run our own shop.”

In the narrow streets of Valletta, café chatter reflected generational divides. Older patrons recalled 1980s hijackers extradited to Italy under Mintoff’s Labour government; younger patrons swapped VPN jokes on TikTok. Meanwhile, Meli’s old secondary-school friends launched a “Free Daniel” Discord channel that already counts 1 300 members and raised €8 000 for legal fees by selling pixel-art NFTs of Maltese buses. “He was the kid who fixed our laptops for free,” said organiser Luke Azzopardi. “Now we’re crowdfunding justice.”

Whether justice means a trial in Malta or Virginia remains uncertain. Prosecutors can appeal the evidence ruling, and the Attorney General still has to decide whether to surrender Meli under the 2005 treaty. For now, the accused must sign a bail book in Floriana every day, surrender his passport and observe a 22:00 curfew – conditions that feel surreal to a man accused of roaming cyberspace at the speed of light.

As the court emptied and the noon cannon fired from the Upper Barrakka, the message echoing off the honey-coloured limestone was clear: Malta will measure American allegations against its own yard-stick of fairness, tradition and a stubborn, island-sized sense of sovereignty. The gavel has fallen, but the cyber-crossfire between Washington and Valletta is only just loading.