Maximilian Ciantar, who was allegedly caught driving just days into a six-month driving ban, never had a driving licence and has been banned from driving three times since 2007, a court heard yesterday.

During yesterday’s proceedings, Police Inspector Robert Vella took the witness stand in the case against Mr Ciantar who stands accused of breaching the driving ban, taking the vehicle without the permission of his father, who owns it, driving without insurance cover and a licence and relapsing.

Mr Ciantar had been jailed for two years and banned from driving for six months in July after being convicted of running over twin girls in April last year as they crossed the road in Attard. He was driving his van at over 100kph at the time.

The suspension of his driving licence had been reduced on appeal from an original 10-year ban after the Appeals Court judge noted that he had never been found guilty of driving dangerously before and so in that regard he was a first-time offender.

He was released from jail in October, eight months early due to good conduct.

The inspector yesterday said that Mr Ciantar was arrested on November 9, in Ħamrun, after he was stopped by two police officers, Clint Zammit and Norbert Micallef from the mobile squad.

Just before his police statement was taken, Mr Ciantar asked the inspector why all the fuss when he was just driving at 30 kilometres an hour, the inspector said.

The inspector told him that he could not drive because he had been banned from doing so.

In the statement he refused to answer any questions, the officer added. Taking the witness stand, a Transport Malta representative told the court that Mr Ciantar had been banned from driving between 2007 and 2009, from 2008 to 2009 and again only recently between October 2011 and 2012. The representative also confirmed that he never held a driving licence. When asked by Magistrate Jacqueline Padovani whether Mr Ciantar had actually taken the driving test and failed, the representative said that he could not tell but could confirm that he did not have a licence and never had one.

In pleas on bail, lawyer Joe Brincat told Magistrate Jacqueline Padovani that his client had spent the last two weeks in preventative custody on charges that would normally be dealt with in a traffic sitting.

In rebuttal, the inspector asked how could Mr Ciantar be trusted to obey bail conditions when he had such a chequered past. He added that this was the third time that he had been banned from driving and was given plenty of chances to reform.

The magistrate granted him bail against a deposit of €1,000 and a personal guarantee of €9,000. She placed him on a curfew and ordered him to sign the bail book every day.