A man currently behind bars for drug-related offences has filed a judicial protest decrying his "illegal arrest" because he had been convicted solely on the basis of a statement he had released during his interrogation without legal assistance.

The protest, filed this morning by lawyers Jason Azzopardi and Kris Busietta on behalf of 40-year-old Trevor Bonnici, comes just 13 days after a court ordered the Commissioner of Police and the Attorney General to pay €3,500 in compensation to a man convicted of cocaine trafficking on the strength of a statement he had made without the assistance of a lawyer.

This judgment had in turn been delivered a few days after the European Court of Fundamental Human Rights had harshly criticised Malta for allowing this practice in the past.

Mr Bonnici had given his statement after he was arrested in 2004. The right to legal assistance of one's choosing during interrogation was only enshrined in Maltese law in 2010.

"It is clear that the plaintiff is serving time and is being denied his freedom following a sentence through which our courts have breached his fundamental human rights," the judicial protest reads.

"Each passing day means that the State couldn't care less about the judgments delivered by the ECHR. It means that the Maltese State is not only an accomplice but also an author in the violation of the plaintiff's right to liberty."

Instead of the Maltese State protecting and enforcing the Rule of Law, the State was one which believed it was above the law and that thought it could continue to live in a cocoon, insulated from its condemnation from the European Court, the protest read.