A tearful Somali woman said in court today that she had been trying to leave Malta using a false passport because her father and two brothers had just been killed in Somalia and she wanted to go back home.

Derma Mommen, 30, admitted to trying to leave using a false passport last Saturday.

The court said that, for humanitarian reasons, the accused was being given a one-year jail term suspended for two years.

During the sitting the accused raised eyebrows when she said she was 17 years old. The Magistrate warned her that the charge sheet gave a different date of birth. The accused said she was confused, and said the details on the charge sheet were the correct ones.

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