A man who was studying English in Malta was handed a €10,000 fine for leaving his home after his flatmate tested positive for COVID-19. Now, he is calling for amnesty following the “unfair” way he says he was fined as he awaits his appeal to be heard in court.

“I was given a penalty of €10,000 and I didn’t even have the virus,” Freddie told Lovin Malta. 

After Freddie’s new flatmate tested positive for the coronavirus in April, he [the flatmate] was told to stay in quarantine.

“During quarantine, he remained in isolation in his room… he had barely moved in a week ago and was feeling quite bad, sick and tired. My flatmate informed the health office about our situation and gave them my contact details, but I wasn’t home that day,” Freddie says.

“I received a call the next day when he got his results back. My English isn’t so good, but I understood I needed to take a test the next day. They also asked me for a person who I didn’t know and didn’t really understand.”

He spent the day waiting for a “car” to be sent to pick him up and do the test. But Freddie says the car never came.

“The next day I went out and when I came back I found a paper in my flat with the fine for €10,000,” Freddie said. “I was scared because I’ve never had legal problems. I asked my flatmate and he told me the police had come to the flat and I wasn’t here… but I told him that I didn’t know anything about it.”

Shortly after, Freddie took the test and it came back negative.

With a legal notice stating that the €10,000 fine was for people who were COVID-19 positive and breaking quarantine, Freddie is now calling for his case to be revisited to see if he should have even been fined in the first place.

“I think what happened to me was unfair. I didn’t understand the call, they didn’t come for me to do the test when they said they would and I wasn’t ever in communication with my flatmate because he was always in his room, too scared he might spread the virus,” he said.

Freddie has renewed hope after hearing Prime Minister Robert Abela speak about showing more compassion to vulnerable people in our society who may have been fined, even though they were genuine cases.

He hopes that authorities may now look into his situation and realise he shouldn’t’ have been fined.

“It is for this reason that I am pro-amnesty,” he ended. “During lockdown there were a lot of people outside without distancing, posting videos on social media hosting house parties and nobody gave them a fine. I am not working at the moment, I’m waiting for my company to reopen and my wage is €1,000 a month. I’d need at least one whole year to pay the whole fine off… I just came to Malta to learn English.”

*Names have been changed.

What do you think of Freddie’s case?