Wedding anniversary turns sour for Britons in Paceville attack

A British couple who celebrated their first wedding anniversary in Malta will be leaving the island with memories of the wrong kind, after they were attacked by a bottle-wielding teenager during a night out in Paceville yesterday.

19 year-old Andrea Galea from Mtarfa stood accused of carrying out the attack after Inspector Trevor Micallef charged him with inflicting grievous injuries using arms improper. He was also charged with breaching the peace.

Micallef told Magistrate Josette Demicoli how police had been called after a fight took place in the early hours of yesterday morning. An injured person had been taken to hospital but had signed himself out, the inspector said.

The injured man had told the inspector that they had been at Havana club in Paceville that night. On his way to the toilet, someone had passed a comment about his appearance. A fight broke out and the accused allegedly smashed a bottle on his head. The wound required 13 stitches. He also suffered cuts to his side.

However, the accused released a statement to police, telling a completely different story, the inspector said. Galea had claimed the man had grabbed his buttocks. When asked what was wrong, the Englishman allegedly threw a cigarette at his friend and made an obscene gesture towards him. A commotion broke out and he “was not sure what happened after that.”

Slash-attack victim Joseph Vine from Portsmouth and his wife Melissa both testified before magistrate Josette Demicoli this morning. “We landed on Monday. I came here to visit my father in law and celebrate our first anniversary.”

He had been at Havana at around 2:45am, he recalled, when on his way out of the bathroom, he heard a group of four men pass a derogatory comment about his appearance. Vine said that he had asked them what they said and was struck in the head with the bottle. “I fell to the floor and he must have swiped my back with the broken bottle.”

The men were escorted outside, the accused was arrested immediately and Vine was taken to hospital in an ambulance. Vine said that he also required stitches to his arm.

He said he had recognized the accused at the police station when he had gone to file a report the next morning after being discharged from hospital.

Cross-examined by defence lawyer Kathleen Grima, Vine said that they had been in Paceville since 8pm. The couple had been drinking cocktails at a bar before going to Havana at around midnight. His recall was calm and clear, in spite of the alcohol intake, down to what he and the accused had been wearing. He was drinking beer at Havana, he said, four or five bottles. “My wife was drinking amaretto and coke.”

The man’s wife, Melissa Vine testified after him. She had been waiting outside the club for her husband when he emerged, covered in blood.

“We weren’t out to get really drunk, so we just had a few [drinks].” She had not been drunk, she said. “I still knew what was going on,” describing her husband as being “merry drunk” not fall-down drunk, at the time.

The defence requested bail, which the court granted in view of the fact that the witnesses had already testified.

Galea was released from arrest against a deposit of €1,500 and a personal guarantee of €5,500. He was also ordered to observe a curfew.