A man who failed to turn up for court-imposed community work has lost a bid to have its conversion to a one-year effective jail term declared as inhumane.

Jason Zammit, from Gozo, was unsuccessful in convincing the court that his imprisonment amounted to inhumane and degrading treatment, given that he had only 18 hours of community work left.

Zammit had been convicted of misappropriating four quad bikes and relapsing in 2016 and was sentenced to 200 hours of community work.

However, soon after sentencing, his probation officer filed a court report that Zammit was not observing the conditions imposed by the court. He was not showing any motivation to do the work he was assigned and even had to be given a different placement.

A year later, another report was filed because Zammit was not turning up for the hours he was assigned and he still had 18 hours left to complete.

In 2019, he appeared before the court charged with failing to observe the judgment and was condemned to one year in jail. He appealed and the decision was confirmed on appeal.

Zammit went one step further, filing a constitutional case in which he claimed that the conversion to a one-year jail term was in breach of his human rights. He claimed that he had appeared in court without the assistance of a lawyer, in breach of his right to a fair hearing, and that the prison sentence subjected him to degrading and inhumane treatment.

Madam Justice Miriam Hayman observed that, although he was not represented by a lawyer during the sitting when he opted to testify in his own defence, he was never precluded from making submissions in writing. She noted that although Zammit told the court that his lawyer was abroad, there was no evidence to back it up, including an application for the case to be deferred.

She said Zammit knew that he would be tried for the original misappropriation case if he failed to observe the community work judgment and the court had already given him an extra year to carry out the hours of community work.

The judge said that, after examining all the case file, it did not appear that any of his human rights had been breached by the first court, including when he appeared unassisted. She said that this case was solely his fault because the courts had already shown a certain leniency towards him by ordering community service.

She rubbished his claim that the imprisonment was disproportionate or that the punishment caused a degree of suffering to qualify as inhuman treatment or torture. It is common sense that a custodial sentence brings about certain bitterness but this did not necessarily amount to inhumane treatment. She, therefore, threw out his claim.