A 31-year-old Syrian man was charged with raping, assaulting and injuring his Maltese girlfriend and burning her car after they broke up because she allegedly cheated on him.
The man pleaded not guilty to all charges, including creating a false Facebook profile to use against his former lover, whom he had lived with for eight years.
He was also charged with the misappropriation of her laptop, damaging her mobile phone and causing the woman and her family to fear him last June. The list of charges also included setting fire to her car on June 11 and damaging a vehicle parked close by.
He was also accused of assaulting the woman and her father on August 23 with a spanner, damaging the man’s car and making use of an identity card belonging to someone else.
The charges also included setting fire to her car
Lawyer Kenneth Grima requested bail.
He explained that his client had married a Maltese woman and they then separated. He then entered a relationship with the alleged victim and the incident in question originated because the woman cheated on him.
The lawyer said it was difficult to understand how a person who lived with someone for eight years as a common-law wife could claim rape. This was often used as a way of getting revenge on a partner as it was difficult to prove.
Some people got revenge by claiming their partner abused their children, he added, insisting his client was still presumed to be innocent and should not be in jail.
The prosecution, led by Police Inspectors Trevor Micallef and Melvyn Camilleri, said the relationship dynamics between the couple were not so simple. There had been several reported acts of violence over the years, they said.
Even if the rape charge were to be removed from the equation, the officers said, there were still all the ingredients to deny bail in this case.
Inspector Camilleri insisted rape could indeed take place within a relationship and, if a woman did not want to have sex, she should not be beaten.
The court denied the bail request at this stage and urged the prosecution to call all witnesses to testify as soon as possible.