Suspended sentence for assault on two policemen

Two men who pleaded guilty to assaulting police officers during the Gudja feast on Sunday were yesterday given a suspended sentence.

This was the second case of violence against the police in a matter of days and comes in the wake of an announcement by the Justice Ministry that it was working on changes to the law to provide for stiffer penalties for those found guilty of such crimes.

Clinton Borg, 27, of Birżebbuġa and Roderick Azzopardi, 32, of Gudja admitted to assaulting two policemen on Sunday at about 5 p.m.

On Monday, Matthew Grech, 33, of Swieqi, denied breaking the window of a police car and violently resisting arrest during an incident at a wedding reception on Saturday.

And last week, five members of the same family were charged with attacking two policemen outside a wedding reception hall, breaking the arm of one of the officers and raining punches on the other.

Defence lawyer Joseph Giglio told Magistrate Audrey Demicoli that Mr Borg had been involved in an argument with another person and the two officers intervened in an attempt to stop the argument from getting out of hand. It was at this point that the two policemen were injured as Mr Borg tried to push through to get to the other person, Dr Giglio said. Lawyer Victor Scerri, for Mr Azzopardi, argued that his client was in no way connected to the argument between Mr Borg and the other person but had intervened to stop the fight. His client admitted he had pushed a policeman out of the way to stop the fight himself.

Both lawyers said they were considering filing a guilty plea and suggested that a suspended jail term be handed down considering that the first charge of violently resisting arrest was an alternative charge to assault by law.

The court handed down a one-year jail term suspended for a year.

Police Inspectors Arthur Mercieca and Priscilla Caruana prosecuted.