On 22 September, the Globe & Mail reported that Malta police had arrested Keith Schembri, who was the chief of staff of former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, as part of an investigation into money laundering of funds derived from kickbacks on sales of Maltese passports. He resigned in November, shortly before Muscat announced he was too was stepping down. Schembri had been a close friend of Yorgen – suspected by police of being the mastermind in the 2017 murder of anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. Fenech has denied complicity in the killing.