Attard councillor fined €200 for injuring man

An Attard local councillor, John Bonnici, was yesterday fined €200 for slightly injuring the man who ran the locality’s Labour Party club during a fight in 2009. Magistrate Claire Stafrace Zammit yesterday found him guilty of breaching the peace, insulting and slightly injuring Richard Vella, 40, on October 28, 2009. In September 2011, Mr Bonnici, 64, had been given a suspended jail term after he admitted to vandalising the balustrades of the Attard parish church parvis on July 16, 2009. The court was told that Mr Bonnici, who sits on the local council of Attard, vandalised the balustrades in a fit of rage after promising certain constituents he would remove them. Following that conviction, Mr Bonnici had resigned from the party but remained on the council as an independent councillor. The party defended his candidature last year, arguing that, since Mr Bonnici had “shouldered responsibility” for his actions, it believed he should not be “barred” from contesting the local election on its behalf. Mr Vella too had been arraigned over the October 2009 fight. He is pleading not guilty to charges similar to those brought against Mr Bonnici. In a statement to the police, he had said...