A 61-year-old man was jailed for 20 months after he admitted to stealing from the donation box of the MUSEUM chapel in Blata l-Bajda, Hamrun.

The theft took place in the afternoon of 26 February, and Farah Said Hirsi, a Somali national who resides at the Marsa open centre, was arraigned two days later.

Mr Said Hirsi had been sentenced to a 6-month jail term suspended for two years only three weeks earlier, and was thus charged with committing a crime during the operative period of a suspended jail term, as well as theft.

He pleaded guilty to the charges brought against him, and Magistrate Aaron Bugeja sentenced him to a 14-month jail term over the theft, and declared that the suspended jail term would be brought into force.

Inspector Robert Vella prosecuted.