Six years jail for 'neighbourhood terror'

A Gharghur man, who a magistrate said seemed to be the terror of the neighbourhood, was yesterday jailed for six years for the attempted murder of his neighbour.

Magistrate Jacqueline Padovani Grima found Peter Azzopardi, 40, guilty of the attempted murder of Claudio Calleja and seriously injuring him when he stabbed him on March 23, 2000, at about 11 p.m.

The magistrate heard how on the night of the incident Calleja got a lift home on the motorcycle of his friend Stephen Sammut.

When Azzopardi heard the sound of the motorcycle he went outside and punched Sammut, causing him to bleed from the nose. Calleja had already gone inside his house.

Some time later Azzopardi knocked at Calleja's door and stabbed him.

But Azzopardi claimed that when he went outside, Calleja, who was still outside with Sammut, spat at him three times and provoked him. He denied carrying a knife and added that had he had a knife he would have stabbed both Calleja and Sammut.

Azzopardi denied stabbing Calleja.

After examining the evidence Magistrate Padovani Grima ruled that it was the behaviour of Azzopardi, "who seemed to be the terror of the quiet alley in Gharghur", that provoked the incident.

"He who presumes that the Maltese roads are his; he who makes a young man's nose bleed because the noise of a motorcycle annoyed him; he who rocks a neighbour's door at night with a knife hidden up his sleeve and brandishes it cannot be taken seriously when he claimed he acted on provocation," the magistrate ruled.

Police Inspectors Simon Galea and Carmelo Magri prosecuted.