A technician prosecuted for taking the law into his own hands, by making off with two computers and hardware from the local council offices, was fined €5 at the end of a saga sparked off by "unprofessional" handling by the council.

Jimmy Paul Saliba, a 38-year old Gozitan, had been tasked by the then executive secretary of the Fontana council to undertake urgent repairs to her computer to ensure important data would not risk being lost.

The technician had duly obliged and had also provided new hardware on the instructions of the secretary who had informed the mayor via a phone call since the latter "did not check his e-mails".

However, eight months later, the €450 bill remained unsettled since, in the meantime, there had been a change in the person occupying the post of executive secretary. Through a unanimous vote in June 2017, the council decided that Mr Saliba's invoice was to "remain in abeyance".

During that same meeting, it was recorded in the minutes that Mr Saliba would be granted permission “to take back the computer parts installed without council authorisation.”

He removed two computers and an external hard drive before a dumbstruck council employee who just looked on helplessly

Getting to know of this decision after a chance encounter with the Fontana mayor, Mr Saliba turned up at the council premises, early one morning in July 2017 and removed two computers and an external hard drive before a dumbstruck council employee who just looked on helplessly.

The council filed a report for “theft” and a notice of the incident was e-mailed to all the relative authorities including the minister and parliamentary secretary as well as the Data Protection Commissioner over a possible data protection breach.

The disgruntled technician was criminally prosecuted for the exercise of a pretended right (ragion fattasi), computer misuse, unauthorised modification to the council’s computer network and impairment of the council’s services.

In a 72-page long judgment, magistrate Joseph Mifsud, while finding the accused guilty of the first offence, concluded that there was insufficient evidence to prove the other charges.

Just because he got to know of the council’s decision permitting him to take back the parts he had installed, did not mean the accused “could arbitrarily, without informing anyone, just enter the council premises and take whatever he pleased,” Magistrate Mifsud declared.

However, turning upon the council, the magistrate deplored the council's “unprofessional and irresponsible behaviour” which had sparked off the whole saga.

The magistrate declared and duly condemned the accused to a nominal €5 fine after pronouncing him guilty of having exercised a pretended right, acquitting him of all other charges.

Moreover, the court decided to do what ought to have been done by the council for the sake of good governance and sent a copy of the judgment to the Local Government Board to investigate the Fontana council's "unprofessional manner".

Inspector Bernard Charles Spiteri prosecuted.

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