Disabled pensioner imprisoned for non-payment of maintenance due to human rights violation

A man sentenced to a total of 17 months in prison for repeatedly failing to pay monthly maintenance to his estranged wife due to financial problems has filed a human rights lawsuit claiming he received a disproportionate sentence.

Pensioner Mario Bartolo, 67, made this claim in a petition filed this week in the First Chamber of the Civil Court in its Constitutional Jurisdiction against the Public Prosecutor and the Attorney General, alleging that he was subjected to degrading and inhumane treatment and discrimination due to the prison sentence.

Bartolo told the court that his wife, from whom he was legally separated, had filed a criminal complaint against him for non-payment of maintenance payments amounting to 466 euros, which led to a criminal trial before two different judges. He was sentenced to a total of 17 months in prison.

The two sentences ordering his detention were currently under appeal.

The man was employed at the time the separation agreement was signed in 2010, but is now retired and is seriously ill and unable to work because some of his toes have been amputated, the lawyers said.

But now, says Bartolo, his ex-wife regularly filed criminal complaints, which led to several pending maintenance proceedings. An application for mediation, which he submitted to the family court, is also pending, he said.

The man’s lawyers, Jose’ Herrera, David Camilleri and Martina Herrera, argue that the prison sentences were disproportionate and did not take into account the man’s changed circumstances.

He was also discriminated against because all the maintenance cases were treated independently, even though there was a clear connection, which meant he could not benefit from a legal provision that would group all the cases together as a single related offense punishable by a lesser sentence .