A man was yesterday charged with defrauding several people of more than Lm1,000 when he allegedly issued a number of cheques which could not be cashed.

The court, presided over by magistrate Giovanni Grixti, heard Reuben Micallef, 33, from St Julian’s, plead not guilty to conspiracy with two other men to defraud Raymond Briffa, Biedbug Development Limited, Audio in San Gwann, Strand Electronics in Msida, Vision 2000 in San Gwann, Infomate Limited in Msida and KVH Computers in Rabat.

The court heard defence lawyer Joseph Giglio explaining that Micallef had applied for a bank loan and also received the sanction letter from the bank.

Based on this sanction letter, and before the funds were actually deposited into his account, he made a number of purchases with post-dated cheques.

One of the people he paid by cheque tried to cash the cheque and as a result the bank withdrew the sanction letter and the loan was not issued.

Dr Giglio said the defence is not contesting that Micallef owed these people money, however his intention was not to defraud them but simply issued post-dated cheques to give time for the money to be deposited into his account.

Dr Giglio requested the court to order a ban on the publication of Micallef’s name because of the effect this would have on his client and also because his client was still innocent until proven guilty. But magistrate Grixti said the court did not see a valid reason why it should order the ban and turned down the request.

He however upheld Micallef’s request for bail against a deposit of Lm1,000.

Police Inspector Ian Abdilla prosecuted while Dr Giglio appeared for the accused.