A taxi driver stepping in as a bouncer at a Paceville club was jailed and fined on Tuesday after he was convicted of drug-trafficking charges.

Patrick Gatt was targeted by police investigations after a male patron at a nearby nightclub, spotted entering the toilets in the company of two female friends, was found in possession of a bag of suspected cocaine.

When the trio was rounded up by the police, the man had broken down in tears, confessing he had just been conditionally discharged over an earlier brush with the law.

Willing to cooperate with the police, the latter described how he had just bought the drug from a bouncer at the door of a nearby club, pointing a finger in the direction of the accused.

Yet, when the officers approached the alleged pusher, who at first offered no resistance to a personal search, all hell broke loose as soon as the police attempted to find out the contents of one particular pocket of the man’s jeans.

The man’s resistance resulted in a scuffle between the suspect and three police officers, with all four men toppling down two flights of stairs and additional help having to be called in to handcuff the recalcitrant man.

It was only then that the personal search could proceed, yielding three small packets of white powder stuffed inside his trousers pocket with later tests confirming they contained some two grams of cocaine of 18% purity.

In the course of criminal proceedings for drug-trafficking and resisting arrest, the accused denied having ever sold drugs to anyone, claiming to have bought the drug for his own personal use, seeking solace in the drug at a time when he was overwhelmed by personal problems.

As for the resistance to the search, the accused explained how on that particular night back in November 2014, he had been approached by three plainclothes men who had not identified themselves as police officers.

“One of them grabbed my finger and twisted it, the other grabbed my arm too and I tried to get my finger free and we ended up on the stairs and fell all the way down to the bottom,” the accused had explained, claiming that he had ended up with a broken tooth in the process.

Several small bags found later at his residence were intended to package lead shot for his homemade shotgun cartridges, while some €500 cash discovered in his car had been intended to cover the repair costs of his sister’s car, the man had claimed.

The court, presided over by magistrate Neville Camilleri, brushed away the defence’s argument that the suspect pusher had been described as a bouncer, whereas the accused was a taxi driver, observing that this was ‘a minor detail’ when taken in the entire context of the case.

Not only had a police eyewitness testified about having seen the accused stopping patrons at the door of the club, but at his home the police had discovered a hidden wall compartment full of small plastic bags.

On the basis of all evidence, the court concluded that the accused’s version was not credible, declaring the man guilty and, after considering reports on his marked progress in battling his drug problem, condemned him to 30-months in jail and a €6,000 fine.

The accused was also ordered to bear the costs of the case, while the drugs were to be destroyed under court order.