Updated 3.45pm with reply

A woman claims that a police officer shoved her to the ground and slammed a door on her hand, fracturing her finger. 

The claim forms the basis of a legal challenge that the 30-year-old filed this week against the police commissioner, calling on him to reverse a decision not to take criminal action against the officer involved.

She alleges that the March 20 incident fractured her finger and left her traumatised and still taking prescription medication, three months on. 

The woman, a Serbian national who has been living in Malta for the past six years, claims that the officer in question “literally slammed her to the ground,” punched her friend in the ear and then knowingly slammed a door on her hand. 

The alleged incident happened on the evening of March 20, when the woman and her friends ended up outside Msida police station following an argument with a taxi driver, who left them there.

Angered that the police allowed the driver to leave the scene without giving them their money back, the group confronted the three officers who had were there.

Two of the officers handled the situation in a friendly manner but the third policeman, who was tall and bald, reacted aggressively by pushing the woman onto the ground, she claims. 

She alleges that when she got up to demand an explanation, the officer “threw me very hard to the floor”. When one of her friends intervened, he reacted by punching her on the ear. 

The two other officers then pulled their colleague away, she says. 

She then headed up the stairs of the police station and demanded to go inside, but the officer then slammed the door shut. She says he was “well aware” that her hand was in the door at the time. 

Moments later, her fingers were soaked in blood. 

Another taxi rushed her to Mater Dei hospital where she was certified as suffering partial amputation of the nail bed on her right fourth finger, as well as fractures to the digit. 

The injuries were certified as grievous.

Two days later, she filed a police report about the incident but there was no follow up. She was subsequently told that no criminal action was to be taken against the officer concerned, even if she were to file a formal criminal complaint.  

She has now started the legal process to attempt to force the police to take action, saying that although she had confronted the officers that evening, the police officer in question had no cause to act with such “brutality”. It was totally unacceptable in a democratic society for the police commissioner to refuse to take criminal action against the person responsible for such wrongdoing, her lawyers argue in the legal challenge. 

Lawyers Francois and Celine Marie Dalli signed the challenge application. 

'Door is self-closing': officer's reply

A lawyer for the officer in question subsequently said that the woman's account was "absolutely not credible".

"Her allegation of suffering bodily harm due to slamming of the Msida main station door on her finger was impossible, since the police station door had and still has a self-closing arm attached to it which makes it impossible for anyone to slam it shut," lawyer Herman Mula told Times of Malta.