A pensioner accused of trying to kill his wife with a hammer told a jury on Thursday the weapon was never solely in his hands, claiming the couple grappled over it during an argument and that his wife struck herself.

Emanuel Borg, 68, was giving evidence in his own defence as his trial over the alleged November 2019 attack on his wife, Maria Dolores Borg, entered its third day.

Borg denies attempting to murder his wife and causing her grievous bodily harm.

Prosecutors allege set upon his wife, bludgeoning her with a hammer while she was asleep inside their Mellieħa farmhouse.

The court previously heard that, shortly after the incident, Borg allegedly approached police officers in the rain and repeatedly asked them to arrest him after calling an ambulance himself.

On Wednesday, however, Borg painted a very different picture, insisting the injuries happened during a heated argument in the kitchen.

'She pulled the hammer and it hit her'

Taking the stand, Borg said the couple had been married for 40 years and had three children, describing their relationship as "not bad" despite flaring tempers from time to time.

He told jurors on the day of the incident, he had returned from working in the fields, changed his clothes and later sat down for lunch.

After finding that his meal was cold, the pair ended up rowing over money.

Borg said he asked his wife for €300 to help him upgrade the room where he stored vegetables before taking them to the pitkal.

He explained that he had always handed over his earnings from his job, and from farming to his wife, who managed the household finances.

"Usually, she would give me the money if I asked her. This time, she wouldn't part with it, because she said I wasn't earning enough from selling produce at the farmers' market. She told me to stay inside and do nothing."

According to Borg, the victim became angry and questioned why he needed the money.

"She said, 'What do you need €300 for? I'll split your head with this hammer!,'" he told the jury.

Borg claimed there was a hammer on the kitchen counter which had been used by his son for DIY work.

He alleged that his wife grabbed the hammer and that he took hold of the handle.

"She pulled it back and she hit herself with the hammer," he said.

Borg claimed the pair continued tussling over the tool, with both of them holding on to it.

He said his wife was struck again during the struggle, including once at the back of the head.

"The hammer was in both our hands, not only mine," he told the court.

The entire incident, he claimed, played out in a matter of seconds.

'When I saw the blood, I panicked'

Borg told the jury that he became frightened when he saw blood and immediately called an ambulance.

He said his wife was initially sitting on the sofa and told him she felt "not too bad, but a bit dizzy".

He said he stepped outside several times to look out for the ambulance before eventually finding her lying on the floor.

Borg said he helped move her onto a bed and later told her that the ambulance had arrived. "She came out slowly and got onto the stretcher," he said.

After police arrived, Borg said he was taken to the Mellieħa police station and locked up in a cell.

He later accompanied officers back to the farmhouse, where he said he saw his daughter mopping up blood from the floor.

He claimed a police sergeant asked him to help retrieve the hammer from the swimming pool for forensic officers.

Borg said he fetched a fishing net so officers could lift the hammer out of the water.

He maintained that he did not sign the police statement because he disagreed with the version being put to him.

"The hammer was in Doris's hands and in mine, not only in my hands," he said.

Forensic doctor describes 'serious' injuries

Earlier, forensic expert Mario Scerri told jurors that victim Maria Dolores Borg suffered serious injuries consistent with blunt force trauma.

Scerri said he arrived at the farmhouse shortly before 3pm and examined Borg before she was taken to Mater Dei Hospital.

Jurors were shown photographs of the victim, wrapped in a blanket, with her hair cut short.

The doctor said Borg was conscious and aware of where she was and who she was, but was not oriented in time. When asked what had happened, she said she could not remember.

Scerri ran through a catalogue of injuries, including lacerations to her upper lip, mouth area and under the right nostril, as well as a haematoma around her right eye.

He explained that the wounds were consistent with a blow from a blunt object rather than a sharp instrument.

The victim also suffered a fracture to the nasal bone and fractures involving the facial area, including the maxillary sinus.

A depression fracture on the frontal bone measured 3.5cm, with the bone displaced by around 0.4cm, the court heard.

Scerri said CT scans ruled out spinal fractures.

He described her condition at the time as serious, although she remained stable in the days that followed. When he examined her again in January 2020, she was responding coherently and correctly to questions.

However, she was left with visible scarring.

Scerri told the jury that one scar on the right side of the frontal bone and another near the right side of the mouth would have been visible from within talking distance.

'Blows to the nose, mouth and head'

Asked by prosecutors how many blows she may have suffered, Scerri said the injuries suggested several impacts.

"There could have been blows to the nose, mouth and head," he said.

He added that facial wounds bleed heavily because the face is highly vascular.

Asked whether bleeding would have started immediately, he replied: "Yes, immediately. You would see spraying."

The doctor said the first few hours after such injuries were the most critical.

"Doctors err on the side of caution because the situation can suddenly turn for the worse," he explained.

A life affected by depression

During his testimony, Borg also spoke about his mental health struggles, telling the jury he had suffered from depression for years.

He said the condition set in after he was wrongly blamed for an incident caused by hunters involving birds at the Għadira nature reserve, where he had worked as a watchman.

He said he had been questioned extensively by police and that the episode took a heavy toll on him.

Borg told the court he had started seeing a psychiatrist afterwards and was taking medication.

He said he took seven tablets in the morning and another eight at night. He claimed all these sapped his strength.

Marriage difficulties

Borg told the jury that his wife had sometimes told him she no longer loved him, saying this had started around 12 years earlier.

He claimed she would sometimes tell him she wished she had divorced him. However, he insisted their marriage was not a bad one.

The couple, he said, slept in separate beds, with the woman citing the fact that he kept trailing large amounts of soil into the bedroom from his farming work as the reason.

He also described how, months before the incident, they had travelled to the Philippines with a mission group, where they spent two months helping poor communities.

During that trip, he said they became friends with a Filipino woman who wanted to come to Malta to work.

The alleged weapon

The hammer with which Maria Dolores Borg was allegedly hit was also exhibited in court.

The trial heard that the weapon was later recovered from the swimming pool, with Borg questioned about how it ended up there.

"If you say you left it in the kitchen, how did it end up in the pool?" the lawyer asked.

Borg replied that he did not know and suggested it could have been thrown in by someone else.

The trial continues on Friday.

Lawyers Kevin Valletta and Justine Brincat from the Attorney General's office are prosecuting. Lawyers Arthur Azzopardi and Lennox Vella are representing the accused.