Man remanded in custody for grievously injuring ex-partner's daughter during argument

A man has been remanded in custody on charges of grievously injuring his ex-partner’s adult daughter after she attempted to intervene in an argument between the two.

Inspector Colin Sheldon charged 43 year-old Milovan Camilleri from Żabbar with grievously injuring the daughter, as well as with attacking her and her mother on 13 June at the woman’s home in Fgura.

The court was told that Camilleri had been in a relationship with the older woman, which had ended last November. Despite the breakup, he would still go to her house to carry out unspecified works.

Camilleri entered a plea of not guilty. His lawyer requested bail, which was not objected to by the prosecution as long as a protection order was issued in favour of the two women.

The court observed that there appeared to be some reticence in giving details of what happened and that the accounts given this morning by both sides did not tally, nor did they make sense. 

Reading from the current incident report, the magistrate noted the mother having told the police that the daughter had asked the defendant to leave the house. She had been coughing and he had told her to stop “because she was making everyone sick.” The daughter had told him to stop, but he had started hitting the mother on the head with an egg carton instead. At one point, he had become enraged and had punched the mother in the face.

However, the court noted, the daughter’s account added that when the mother had warned the defendant that she would phone up his mother, he became very angry and tried to snatch the mother’s phone out of her hand. The daughter had stopped him from doing so, at which point he had told her not to interfere and headbutted her in the face.

Lawyer Yanika Bugeja was appointed legal aid defence counsel. She told the court that the defendant lived with his mother and had met the older victim while recovering from an operation. He was unemployed but would carry out works at the woman’s house, even after their relationship ended, she said.

She pointed out that the alleged victim’s accounts of events did not tally and that the defendant had been trying to help out at home at the time. 

The court asked the prosecution whether the mother had been informed of today’s sitting. She had not, replied inspector Sheldon, explaining that only the daughter had been told due to an oversight.

Magistrate Frendo Dimech pointed out that the Victims of Crime Act placed an onus on the police to inform the victim of sittings and allow them to participate. Bail was denied.