A 30-year-old man has been jailed for giving his pastizzi supplier over €9,500 worth of cheques drawn on a bank account that he had closed several months before.

The man was sentenced to 38 months in prison for cheque fraud and violating a previous probation order.

A court heard how he initially used to pay for food supplied by Mario Kitcher for his Marsa pastizzi shop without any problems.

Further down the line, a few cheques bounced, but the accused would make good for these by paying in cash.

Mr Kitcher testified that when the accused was set to get married in 2011, he asked him not to cash a number of post-dated cheques given to him.

The victim was instead promised cash payments from the wedding gifts the accused said he would receive.

The victim was promised cash payments from the wedding gifts

After the man got married, he told the victim that he did not receive any wedding gifts, and therefore requested to pay his supplier €500 per month.

Cheques presented in court showed that he was owed over €9,500 at this point. When Mr Kitcher tried to cash some of the cheques, he was informed that the Banif bank account on which they were drawn had been closed.

The analysis of a text message sent on July 4 presented in court show that the accused admonished Mr Kitcher for trying to cash the cheques.

Mr Kitcher’s business partner Jason Aquilina testified that they would send daily deliveries to the Marsa pastizzi shop.

Bills for the previous weeks’ supplies would be sent the following Monday, and normally paid the same day or the next.

Mr Aquilina said that they had started receiving post-dated cheques when the accused fell behind on payments.

They stopped providing him with supplies soon after.

A criminal complaint was filed by the victim on July 31, 2012.

The court heard that the accused had said initially that he had told Mr Kitcher the account on which the cheques had been drawn was closed.

He said that the post-dated cheques were given to Mr Kitcher as proof of the money owed, and were never meant to be cashed.

He later admitted that the victim had not known that the bank account in question had been closed.

The court remarked that the cheques would not have been accepted as a guarantee of payment had the victim known the bank account was no longer open.

Magistrate Donatella Frendo Dimech noted that the accused had violated a previous probation order for stealing cash from a pastizzi shop in San Gwann.

In handing down the sentence, the magistrate took into consideration the fact that the accused had not taken advantage of the opportunity given to him by the courts to reform. Inspector Rennie Stivala prosecuted.

August 21, 2023: Article amended following a data privacy request. For more information please contact editor@timesofmalta.com