A young driver charged with causing a collision with a police vehicle was cleared of all criminal wrongdoing because of a “serious conflict of evidence” as to the dynamics of the crash. 

The incident occurred late on March 1, 2022, when Michela Vassallo had dropped off her friend at her Żabbar residence after university classes and was on the way home.

She was driving down a side road onto Triq Wied il-Għajn when she sensed a flashing light approaching on the right. 

That light was the cruise light of a police vehicle. 

A female officer seated in the front passenger seat later recalled how that evening, while on night watch at Żabbar police station, they received a call about a suspected break-in at Wied il-Għajn. 

Together with three colleagues - two male and a female constable - headed out in a service car, a 2019 Peugeot model.

One of the male officers took the wheel, the other two sat at the back and the fourth officer sat next to the driver. 

As they cruised down Triq Wied il-Għajn, they spotted a white car exiting a side street past a stop sign.

All four officers testified in court when Vassallo was charged with causing the incident in which the police driver suffered a fractured wrist. 

She was also charged with ignoring the stop sign. The prosecution requested the court to ban the defendant’s driving licence. 

The defendant pleaded not guilty. 

The constable who was driving the service car testified that he had spotted a car exiting the side street on the left, turning in their direction. 

He claimed that he saw the driver looking the other way. 

“I tried to avoid her but she blocked my path… I tried to avoid her but I couldn’t,” he explained. 

The impact occurred as the defendant was manoeuvring her car onto the main road, claimed the witness. 

“So how come the damages are on the vehicle’s side rather than the front?” asked defence lawyer Mario Buttigieg. 

Upon impact, her car turned because the road surface was wet, the police driver explained.

The policewoman seated beside the driver said that her colleague swerved to the left to avoid impact to no avail. 

Following the crash, she approached the female driver to check on her condition. 

“She [the defendant] said: ‘Sorry, sorry. I don’t know what happened,’” the policewoman recalled. 

Vassallo was in a state of shock. She was taken to Mater Dei Hospital by ambulance. The officers in the police car were also given medical attention. 

A surveyor tasked by an insurance company, reported in court that damages to the police car amounted to just over €8,000. 

Asked by the defence, he confirmed that the car must have been going at speed since the airbags were inflated and that happened when there was rapid deceleration. 

Vassallo also testified in the proceedings, giving a different version as to how the collision took place.

She recalled driving over a speed bump located a few metres away from the stop sign. 

She then drove towards the stop sign and sensed a light flashing on the right. 

Then suddenly, moments after stopping at that sign, a car ploughed at speed into her car.

“I ended up in the left lane in Triq Wied il-Għajn,” she explained. 

Following the crash, she was in a state of “great shock”.

She spent the night in the hospital because she was complaining of palpitations, pain in her side and a terrible shock. 

Her car was beyond repair. All airbags were inflated upon impact.

Vassallo also told the court about a brief conversation that had taken place in hospital that night. 

While in the waiting area at Mater Dei’s emergency department, she spoke to one of the female officers involved in the crash, asking, “Where was I when the collision took place?”

“I saw you stationary at the stop sign and told him [the police driver] ‘watch out’, and then we crashed,” the policewoman allegedly replied. 

That conversation was witnessed by the defendant’s father who had rushed to his daughter’s side and who subsequently confirmed it in court. 

When delivering judgment, Magistrate Yana Micallef Stafrace observed that there was “a serious conflict of evidence regarding how the incident occurred”.

On the one hand, the defendant claimed she was stationary at the stop sign when the police car crashed into her vehicle.

On the other hand, the police witnesses were saying that the defendant had gone past the stop sign straight into the path. 

That conflict meant that the court lacked certainty beyond a reasonable doubt to conclude that Vassallo was responsible for the incident, concluded the court, thus pronouncing an acquittal. 

Lawyer Mario Buttigieg was the defence counsel.