A father and his son were yesterday jailed for eight and six months respectively after an assault on a police inspector and a number of other officers.
Carmel Dimech, 46, from Zebbug and his son Ludwig Dimech, 24, also from Zebbug, were found guilty of assaulting and injuring police inspector Josric Mifsud on 19 July 2004. They were also found guilty of resisting arrest, disobeying police orders, breaching the peace and damaging police uniforms.
During the proceedings, police inspector Mifsud testified that he had just arrested an Arab man, who told him that he was staying with a certain Charles in Zebbug who had taken his passport from him. He also said that there were other men being held there.
The man showed them the residence in question and Insp. Mifsud contacted Dimech by phone and asked him to go to the station for questioning. Dimech refused, so the inspector obtained a search warrant from the duty magistrate and proceeded to Dimech’s house.
He said that he took a troop of officers to the house, and met Dimech’s son, Ludwig, whom he questioned about his father’s whereabouts. The son said his father was not home, but the police spotted Charles Dimech sitting at a table in the residence.
Insp. Mifsud ordered Charles Dimech to come out of the house, and he did so, but ran at the officer and pushed him. Seeing this, he said, Sergeant Patrick Bonnici intervened and pushed the accused back.
On witnessing this, Ludwig Dimech shouted that no one could touch his father and he, in turn, tried to punch Insp. Mifsud. The police managed to pull Ludwig Caruana away and he resisted arrest as they tried to get him back to the station, said Insp. Mifsud.
The court, presided over by magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera, disagreed with the defence’s labelling of the event as “a storm in a teacup”. Magistrate Scerri Herrera said that the police should be protected in the carrying out of their duties. She also added that while force should only be used by the police as an exception to the rule, it is justified in preventing a person from committing a crime or if a person is resisting arrest.
The court therefore sentenced Charles Dimech to eight months’ imprisonment and Ludwig Dimech to a six-month jail term. They were also ordered to pay Lm83 in court expenses. Police inspectors Carmelo Magri and Pierre Micallef Grimaud prosecuted.