Thursday evening, at around 21:00, a person was murdered and two others were injured in the heart of Tirana, its most heavily populated area, known as ish-Blloku.
The victim of this mafia assassination was 26-year-old Fabiol Gaxha, the bodyguard of Ervis Martinaj, who was the target of the assassination, and was injured in the attempt. Elion Hado, 28, was also injured.
Initially, Gaxha, Martinaj, and Hado argued with the perpetrator in a bar in the Bllok area. Afterwards, the two parties began shooting at each other. The police suspects three guns were used.
It seems that the Force of Law, the initiative praised so much by Interior Minister Xhafaj and Prime Minister Rama, has not been able to guarantee rule of law even in the very center of Tirana.
The police was not unfamiliar with the names of Gaxha, Martinaj, and Hado.
Ervis Martinaj was one of the main suspects in the murder of Enton Nika, in November 2015, in a parking lot near Linza. The video recording that showed Ervis Martinaj and 5 other persons punching Nika and shooting at him became public immediately following Nika’s murder.
Despite this strong evidence, in May 2016, the Tirana Court decided to dismiss the Prosecution’s demands to try this case as one of collaborative “premeditated murder”, and sentenced Ervis Martinaj to only one year and four months in prison for “failing to report a crime”. The court ruled that the criminal act of Nika’s murder was not premeditated, and was not done cooperatively by the defendants Ervis Martinaj, Emiljano Tasho, Bujar Hasani, and Mirsad Kuçana.
After his release from prison, Ervis Martinaj always traveled accompanied by his bodyguard Fabiol Gaxha, in fear of a possible assassination.
Fabiol Gaxha is suspected of having been involved in drug trafficking.
