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15 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 4 OCTOBER 2026 NEWS forcing courts to send legally insane people Mount Carmel faces constitutional test promulgated in 1854". The man has since appealed the detention order and last Wednesday, the Court of Criminal Appeal, presided over by Judge Neville Camilleri, re- ferred the challenge to the civil court sitting in its constitution- al jurisdiction. That court must now decide whether detaining someone because they were declared le- gally insane when an offence was committed, without con- sidering whether they are still mentally ill when the detention order is made, breaches their fundamental rights. What happened in 2020 In the summer of 2020, police were called to an animal sanc- tuary where the man, then 21, had only recently started vol- unteering. It was his second visit. He was charged with sexually assaulting the sanctuary's man- ager, causing her slight injuries, making her fear violence and damaging her property. The woman told police the as- sault went on for about an hour before she managed to break free and lock herself in the office. Officers arrived to find her running to open the gate, with the man on her heels. He re- fused to obey orders and had to be handcuffed. One officer said the man "wasn't in his senses". The of- ficer in charge of the case de- scribed him as "a lost man". "I told the sergeant to call his parents," he said, because even the man's posture "wasn't that of a normal person you'd see at the station". A psychiatrist who examined him that day certified that he was suffering from a psychotic episode and sent him to Mount Carmel under an emergency or- der. "The risk was such that I did not feel it was safe for him to be in the community," the psychia- trist later told the court. The man remained at Mount Carmel until August 2021. He told doctors he remembered nothing of the alleged assault. What 'insanity' meant in this case The Magistrates Court ruled on the case in July 2026, more than six years after the events themselves. The psychiatrist who treated the man in hospital described him as "completely detached from reality", "living in an alter- native universe" and "one of the worst patients that ever came under my care". The psychiatrist who has treat- ed him in the community since 2021 said that, in her 25 years of experience, "this is a classic case" of someone who lacked the capacity to understand and control his actions. Court-appointed expert Prof. Anton Grech likewise concluded that the man "was suffering from severe psychosis" on the day of the alleged offences. But the magistrate pointed out that being mentally ill does not, by itself, make someone legally insane. A person can suffer from a mental illness and still be held criminally responsible for what they do. For the legal defence of insani- ty to apply, the illness must have robbed the person of the abil- ity to grasp what they were do- ing, to know it was wrong, or to choose whether to do it. The prosecution and the vic- tim argued that the man must have known what he was doing, pointing to an earlier incident in which he had talked his way out of being dismissed after anoth- er volunteer complained about him. But the magistrate was not convinced. Even if he understood that his actions were wrong, the mag- istrate said, his psychosis was "certainly severely impairing" his ability to make decisions. His attempt to attack the wom- an again in front of police also showed, she said, that he had "no inhibition" at all. The magistrate found it more likely than not that he lacked at least the capacity to choose, and did not go on to decide whether he had committed the acts al- leged. Tied hands The man accepted the finding that he was legally insane, but appealed the detention order that followed. The Criminal Code says that once an accused person is de- clared insane, the court must order him to be held at Mount Carmel Hospital and kept there under provisions of the Mental Health Act. But by the time of the July 2026 judgment, the evidence showed a very different picture. His condition had improved substantially with treatment. He was receiving treatment in the community and had gone back to his studies. The magistrate said that he was "slowly trying to reintegrate into society". Even so, she said, the law left her no alternative but to commit him to hospital. The appeal The man asked the Appeals Court to cancel the detention order and impose a treatment order instead. He argued that mandatory de- tention breached his rights to liberty, protection from inhu- man treatment, and respect for his private and family life. The Appeals Court said the case revolved around two dif- ferent points in time—the per- son's mental state when the al- leged offence was committed, which determines criminal re- sponsibility, and their mental state when their liberty is being restricted. It has now left that question to the Constitutional Court, which will have to decide whether the mandatory detention provisions as they stand can be reconciled with the Maltese Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights. The Criminal Code obliges the courts to send a person deemed legally insane to Mount Carmel Hospital Magistrate Marse- Ann Farrugia made clear in her judgment last July that she was uncomfortable with the detention order she was legally required to make