A migrant worker who fell two storeys in a construction site testified from his hospital bed on Thursday how he was allegedly dumped in the middle of a street by his employer and had to drag himself on his elbows to the nearest pavement.

Lamin Jaiteh told a seven-hour court sitting he thought he was going to die after his boss, Glen Farrugia, pulled him by his armpits from the back of a company van and then drove off.

Jaiteh has been in hospital since the incident at a construction site in Mellieħa on September 28.

“I used my elbows to drag myself on to the pavement because I was in the middle of the road,” he told a court via video link from Mater Dei hospital, where he is being treated for back and arm injuries.

“I don’t know how many minutes passed but I was saying, ‘help me, help me’. I was trying not to lose consciousness, because I didn’t know where I was.”

The 32-year-old father-of-two testified for almost three hours in the first day of the compilation of evidence against Farrugia, a contractor who denies grievous bodily harm and a series of health and safety and employment breaches.

Came to Malta from Italy in May 

He told the court that he came to work in Malta from Italy in May and began working as a painter. He moved on because the pay wasn't good. On September 17, he went to look for work and found a construction site in Mosta owned by the accused, Glen Farrugia.

Farrugia asked him to begin work cleaning scaffolding. He also helped make shutters for concrete. He earned €50 a day, working from 6.30am to 5pm with a five minute break.

"I agreed to work every day except Sunday," he said.

He said he was not given any safety equipment.

"I have my own safety shoes but no helmet, no jacket. When I lost my safety shoes, he (Farrugia) gave me €40 to buy a pair. Then at the end of the week, he took the €40 back."

He said that on the day of the incident he went to work in Mosta but Farrugia told him to go to the Mellieħa site, where he was tasked with cleaning the rooftop and using a crane to put up ‘concrete blocks’.

 At one point he needed a hammer to take out some nails from wood, so he decided to go down to ask his colleague to give him one. He described how he was at the top, on the second floor of the construction site and stepped on the scaffolding.

"When I stepped on the scaffolding, I found nothing to hold on to and fell down."

The scaffolding felt on top of him and he could not get up so his colleague laid him flat on the ground, he said.

When Glen Farrugia, who was on the other ide of the site arrived, Jaiteh said he was in a lot of pain and crying.

‘If you call an ambulance, everyone here will end up in jail’ 

"I told them please help me, I'm dying. Please call an ambulance... He told me 'no, if you call an ambulance, everyone here will end up in jail'."

Instead, Farrugia told the other workers to put him on a makeshift stretcher made of plywood and carry him to his car. He told him he would take him to hospital himself.

Jaiteh described being in the car crying and asking for help. They left the building site and approached a big roundabout.

"When we got there, he (Farrugia) told me I’m going to leave you somewhere and someone else will get you,” he said.

Jaiteh described how the van left the main road and went down a small road (near Selmun), where he was left.

"I was afraid because he said we were going to the hospital and I didn't know what his plan was or when he was going to drop me. Then he dropped me at the roadside there.

"I don’t know where he stopped. He stopped in the middle of the road. He removed the seat belt. He dragged me.

"It was very painful. It was a pain like I'd never experienced in my life. It was my whole body, I couldn't tell where the problem was and my legs weren’t responding."

Jaiteh said he was dragged to the road and Farrugia told him, "If the police ask you, tell them a car hit you.

"Then I saw him calling someone, I thought maybe he was calling an ambulance, I don’t know. He was saying 'a black guy is here on the road' but then he said something else I didn’t understand."

Farrugia then drove off.

'I used my elbows to drag myself'

Jaiteh said he was not sure how long he was left there.

"I used my elbows to drag myself on to the pavement because I was in the middle of the road," he said.

"I don’t know how many minutes passed but I was saying ‘help me, help me’, I was trying not to lose consciousness, because I didn’t know where I was. And I was doing that until those two girls passed in the road."

The ‘two girls’ were the young women who were among the first to help him.

Jaiteh informed the police about the name of his employer.

When he was taken to hospital, he was X-rayed and had a cast put on his hand.

"The doctor tells me now that I have a broken hand and broken bones in my back," he said.

"They told me they have to operate on my hand."

No training, no work permits 

Replying to various questions by the prosecution and the defence, Jaiteh said he never had any training relating to construction but he did work in plastering at home, in Gambia. Before coming to Malta he worked as a tailor.

Asked by the defence about work documents and his status in Malta, Jaiteh replied he had ‘nothing’. He had Italian documents, but none from the Maltese authorities. He did not know whether he had permission to work in Malta legally.

"I knew the boss has to do a contract for you so you can get a working permit. So I asked him about it," he told the court. He asked Farrugia and thought he had to take care of it.

Caroline Galea, who with Rebecca Borg St John assisted Jaiteh, described how they were out on a walk when she saw a man in the street with three people standing over him – a middle-aged man and a British couple. They explained he was found on the street and his boss had thrown him there. The man told her an ambulance had been called 10 minutes before.

"He was panicked and crying and he was saying 'help me, help me' over again and I realised he was in panic. So I went where he could see me, I held his hand and told him to breathe."

After a marathon sitting, the accused was granted bail, subject to a number of conditions.