FLASH
Shkruar nga Pamfleti
The Special Court of Appeal has postponed the session for the review of the appeal of the Special Prosecution Office (SPAK), which opposes the decision of the First Instance to declare Elvis Duka innocent in the case of the murder of former State Police officer, Santiago Malko.
The hearing was not held after Elvis Duka's defense claimed that their client had not been notified in accordance with legal procedures. The claim was made even though the lawyers were present in the courtroom, which led to the postponement of the case.
Almost seven years after the assassination attempt on Santiago Malko, the Special Court of First Instance sentenced five defendants to a total of 130 years in prison. Leonard Duka was found guilty as the organizer and mastermind of the murder, and was sentenced to 30 years in prison, while his brother, Elvis Duka, was found not guilty. SPAK is seeking to overturn this decision on appeal.
Fatmir Hyseni, Aleksadër Maxhaku, Dritan Aga and Oltion Lona, who the court considered part of the group that carried out the execution, were also sentenced to 25 years in prison for the same case.
Leonard Duka was arrested in Belgium in February 2024 and extradited to Albania in August of that year to face Albanian justice.
Other individuals, tried in separate trials due to their arrests at different times, have also been sentenced with final decisions in this case. Blendi Teta will ultimately serve 25 years in prison, after the Court of Appeal reinstated the same sentence in December 2025, after the Supreme Court overturned the decision.
Ilir Selmani was also sentenced to 28 years in prison for the same incident. The previous decision against him was overturned by the Supreme Court and the case was returned for retrial. During this process, Selmani was released from detention for several weeks due to the expiration of the security measure and was kept under house arrest under police supervision, until the Appeals Court decided the final sentence and his return to prison.
Santiago Malko was killed on August 27, 2019 in Tirana. According to the investigation, the assassination was related to the conflict between Leonard Duka and Ervis Martinaj, who was considered a close friend of the victim. The prosecution managed to shed light on the dynamics of the event through communications provided by the encrypted platform Sky ECC, where, according to the investigation file, the organization and execution of the assassination were discussed.
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