A 19-year-old man was charged with assaulting and slightly injuring a police officer who intervened to calm down an argument between him and his girlfriend in Valletta early yesterday morning.

Josef Xerri, from Valletta, pleaded not guilty to threatening, assaulting and injuring Police Sergeant Andrew St John, disobeying police and refusing to give his particulars at about 4.30am.

Mr Xerri was also charged with relapsing and committing a crime during the operative time of a suspended jail term and while he was on conditional discharge.

Police Inspector Trevor Micallef said this was not the first time Mr Xerri had attacked police. He objected to Mr Xerri being granted bail as “maybe people will learn to stop treating police like rubbish”.

He said that police officers who were working during the festive season, rather than staying home with their family, should not have to return home with injuries.

Mr Xerri was denied bail.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.