A 27-year-old Zabbar man was yesterday jailed for six months for regularly beating up his younger sister.

She became so afraid of him that she ended up sleeping on a mattress in a garage with her young child.

"This case is truly repugnant and the defendant ought to be ashamed of acting in such a ferocious manner towards his younger sister," Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera said.

She added that their parents too ought to be ashamed of favouring their son, Milovan Camilleri, over their daughter and allowing a situation whereby the daughter was relegated to sleeping in a garage, with her 15-month-old daughter, while their son slept comfortably in his bedroom.

Magistrate Scerri Herrera heard the young woman explain that on December 9, 2005, she was in the garage with her daughter.

Her brother became aggressive when her daughter touched some of his tools. When she noticed that he was about to get violent - something she had learnt to detect through past experience - she put the toddler in the playpen.

Mr Camilleri punched a cupboard and everything on it went crashing to the ground. He was about to hit her when her mother intervened and stopped him momentarily.

The young woman explained that she then kicked his car, without damaging it since it was covered in cardboard. Then, as she ran for the garage door, her brother grabbed her and slammed her against it.

Their parents tried to stop him but they did not succeed and he started punching her in the face as he held a (drinking) glass in his hand.

When their parents managed to make him leave the garage, she looked at her face in a mirror and saw she was covered in blood. She decided to go to the police because she could not take it any longer.

Her mother tried to stop her from doing so because she feared that her son, who worked in security, would lose his job and that he would pay her back.

But the young woman felt she could not go on living in fear and headed to the police station after her father encouraged her to file the report.

The young woman explained that her brother had been beating her up since she was six and had even dislodged her cheekbone and burst her eardrum.

Two months before the garage incident, he had attacked her again and, although she needed two stitches, she did not get them done because her father said they would make her look ugly.

The witness said she was so afraid of her brother that she lived in the garage with her daughter. They slept on a mattress and at night they felt the chill creep in from under the garage door.

On evaluating the case, the magistrate ruled she was very disappointed with the parents who favoured their son over their daughter.

"The parents ought to be ashamed of themselves," she ruled. As for the accused the magistrate added: "There's no other way of putting it, other than he should be ashamed to show his face to society and there is no doubt that he ought to apologise to his sister for the hell he put her through when it was his duty to protect her".

The magistrate found Mr Camilleri guilty of slightly injuring his sister over the past years.

She ruled that, although he had a clean criminal record, such a case did not merit the clemency of the court. He deserved an effective jail term.

She ordered that a copy of the judgment be sent to Appogg and to the Ministry of Social Solidarity so that they would find alternative accommodation for the victim.

Police Inspector Anthony Cassar prosecuted.