A judge yesterday lambasted two restaurant owners for “abusing the correct administration of justice” after they filed four warrants of injunction to stop the removal of an illegal timber canopy outside their property.

Mr Justice Joseph Zammit McKeon noted how the men had filed three requests in court to stop the removal of the canopy but all were turned down and only six days after the last refusal, a fourth attempt was made.

The requests were all made against the Land Department and revolved around a timber canopy built outside the Neptune’s Bar and Restaurant in Marsalforn, Gozo, which Francis and George Schembri claimed was their property.

The Land Department said the fact that the planning authority had issued a permit for building the canopy did not mean that it gave a title to the men. Furthermore, they had no contract to show that they were the rightful owners of the land in question.

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