Former Assistant Police Commissioner Mario Tonna, who was named in court last week as having received money from Melvin Theuma and of providing him with sensitive police information, has been on the government payroll for years in a senior position overseeing the governance of voluntary organisations.
The Shift is informed that Tonna is employed as a senior manager within the legal section of the Office of the Commissioner for Voluntary Organisations (OCVO), where his duties involve scrutinising the governance and compliance of NGOs.
Sources close to the ministry responsible for the voluntary sector, headed by Minister Julia Farrugia, said Tonna has occupied the position for several years.
His recruitment dates back to the tenure of former Commissioner for Voluntary Organisations Anthony Abela Medici, who headed the office between 2018 and 2021.
Anthony Abela Medici
The appointment is particularly significant following evidence emerging during the ongoing trial of Yorgen Fenech over the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Last week, pardoned middleman Melvin Theuma told jurors that he had given Tonna money when the then-senior police officer was experiencing financial difficulties. Theuma also said Tonna provided him with sensitive information concerning evidence recovered by investigators following the December 2017 arrests of the Degiorgio brothers.
The information included details concerning the burner phone used to link Theuma with hitman Alfred Degiorgio.
Tonna’s employment at the OCVO was not previously unknown.
As early as 2021, reports stated that Abela Medici had recruited the former Assistant Commissioner as an investigator involved in determining whether voluntary organisations qualified for enrolment.
The connection between the two also extends to their previous careers.
Before becoming NGO commissioner, Abela Medici spent more than 30 years working in the Police Forensic Laboratory and collaborated extensively with the police on criminal investigations.
Tonna resigned from the police force in January 2018 following domestic violence allegations made by his then-partner. He was subsequently acquitted after the woman declined to testify.
His controversial police career stretched further back.
In 2011, Tonna was convicted of harassing a superior and prevented from seeking promotion. Despite this, following Labour’s return to government, he was promoted to superintendent in 2015 and Assistant Commissioner in 2017.
After leaving the force, Tonna remained within the public sector and even applied to become Police Commissioner in 2020.
His continuing government employment now places him in an incongruent position of overseeing standards of governance and compliance within Malta’s voluntary sector despite the controversies that have marked his own public career.
