A police constable is claiming that the Police Commissioner discriminated against him by ignoring his request to be boarded out on account of mental health issues.

That denial allowed sufficient time for the Public Service Commission to suspend the officer, he has argued in court. 

The 38-year-old policeman, Justin Magro, aired his grievances in a judicial protest filed on Tuesday before the civil courts, claiming that his handling by the police chief contrasted sharply with that adopted in respect of fellow colleagues who had put forward a similar request. 

The officer says his ordeal started last July when he presented a psychiatrist’s certificate to the police’s doctor, attesting that he could no longer perform his duties on account of mental health issues. 

He therefore asked his superiors to appoint a medical board to deal with his case.

Two days later, he called the police doctor to make sure that she had received the certificate, but was told to take it back since he had been suspended by the Public Service Commission. 

That information, although not true at that stage, was news to the constable. 

The officer contends that he was subsequently assured by the director in charge that his boarding out process would proceed – only to be told months later by that same director that “she could not understand what he wanted.”

Then, in August 23 he was formally informed that the medical board could not be convened since the applicant had been suspended by the Public Service Commission. 

His lawyer had then asked the director to cite the regulation on which that decision was based. But despite two reminders to that original request, he had not been given a reply. 

He is now protesting that the police commissioner acted in an unlawful and unreasonable manner and in bad faith, when he totally ignored the officer’s request to be boarded out. 

While that request was left pending, the Commissioner allowed the Public Service Commission enough time to issue its order suspending the policeman. 

That suspension was apparently a precautionary measure stemming from the fact that the officer was to face criminal charges in court, said his lawyers.

However, the officer was still deemed innocent at this stage. 

His handling by the police chief was very different to the treatment meted out to former inspectors Roderick and Daniel Zammit, argued the lawyers, thus calling for such discrimination to stop. 

All this was affecting negatively the policeman’s mental health, said the lawyers, holding the Police Commissioner responsible in damages. 

Lawyers Jason Azzopardi and Kris Busietta signed the judicial protest.