A woman was spared 40-days behind bars on Wednesday when her conviction over allegations of loitering in Marsa was found to have been based on mere “presumptions of fact”. The 48-year old woman from Mqabba had been found guilty of loitering for prostitution in February following an incident that took place one evening in October 2019. A police squad patrolling an area of Marsa, notorious for prostitution, spotted two women who were provocatively dressed. The officers approached the women, checked their personal details, told them to leave and warned them that charges would be issued in due course. A while later, the patrol came across a third woman, the accused, who appeared to be hanging around Triq Belt il-Ħażna, in the vicinity of a bar. She was also told to go home and warned that she would face prosecution. Charges were eventually issued and the woman was found guilty of loitering with intent but not of relapsing, and was given a 40-day jail term. Her lawyers, Franco Debono and Marion Camilleri, filed an appeal arguing that the conviction was based on a wrong assessment of facts and that the prosecution had failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. The accused...