A Nigerian man ended up back behind bars hours after serving a 10-year jail term over drug trafficking.

Joseph Feilazoo, a 42-year old, who last Tuesday expected to walk out of jail a free man after spending 10 years behind bars, got into trouble when he was escorted from Corradino to Police Headquarters where he was to meet an immigration officer.

He  was told that he was to be handed over to Detention Services officers who would accompany him to the Safi detention centre, since certain documents were not in order and that he was to be removed from the country.

The news did not go down well. The man at first argued that he could not be removed from the country since he still had two pending constitutional cases before the local courts. However, his arguments soon gave way to anger as he flew into a rage and turned upon the officers keeping watch over him.

Prosecuting Inspector Priscilla Caruana Lee explained in court that the man had attacked the two Detention Services Officers who were in the room, even managing to bite one of them.

The alleged aggressor was arrested on the spot and escorted to court on Thursday afternoon, his arm in a sling and wearing an apparently blood-stained sweater.

The man pleaded not guilty to having assaulted or violently resisted the two officers, threatened or reviled them, caused them slight injuries, disobeyed lawful police orders and disturbed the public good order and peace.

A request for bail, filed by the man’s counsel Sarah Pirotta Chircop Beck, was turned down by the court.

Magistrate Yana Micallef Stafrace remanded the man in custody, while ordering that there was to be no contact between him and the two officers involved in the incident so as to safeguard the integrity of the judicial process.