Prosecutor calls Akis’ wife and daughter to the stand

This Thursday will see a new round of pleas, after the imprisonment of Akis Tsochatzopoulos, Euphrosyne Lampropoulos, Asterios Economides, Nikolaos Zigras and George Sachpatzidis, who allegedly were involved in bribes from two armament programs and the laundering of that money by acquiring - through offshore companies - dozens of luxurious properties.

According to reports, investigator Gabriel Malis has already sent plea calls to ten more people facing charges of money laundering and are mentioned in the findings of prosecutors Eugenia Siskou and Helen Kyvelou.

They are: Akis’ wife Vicky Stamati, her brother Panagiotis Stamatis, her aunt Aikaterini Stamati, Akis’ daughter Areti, lawyer Talita-Maria Tsekoura, Nikolaos Georgoulakis, Pantelis Zahariadis, Oratios Melas, Konstantinos Antoniadis and Eftyhios Atsopardis.

V. Stamatis, who is the recipient of the neoclassical house in Dionysiou Areopagitou, has supported in her preliminary plea that the financial aspect was managed exclusively by her husband. Most likely she will follow the same line in her plea before the magistrate.

As for her brother, Panagiotis Stamatis, the prosecutor's findings give him an active role in the aesthetic improvement of the house in Dionysiou Areopagitou. He signs most documents as "Panagiotis Papaliakos" using the surname of his former wife to conceal that he is V. Stamatis' brother. At that time Tsohatzopoulos and his wife did not even appear as owners of the property, which occured in April 2010 when the neoclassical estate came into V. Stamatis' possession at a price of 1,100,000.00 euros.

In the investigation of the two prosecutors, officials found in P. Stamatis’ house a handwritten statement with the amounts expended to each contractor for renovation. These amounts match the amounts deposited in banks or paid in cash, but not those relating to the information included in the tax statements.

It is noteworthy that among the confiscated findings there is a manuscript with the benefit from avoiding payment of 76,000 euros, which is the equivalent of VAT for work of 560,000 euros. The renovation of the neoclassical property that lasted about three years, "comes at least to 709,872.50 euros but the supporting documents account only for 149,872 euros.

According to the two prosecutors, "the fact that these documents were issued for considerably smaller amounts demonstrates that Tsochatzopoulos acted as a real owner of the property and not on behalf of another, because then he would not have been interested in participating in tax fraud by contractors and suppliers in order for himself to have a proportional gain, but he would have made sure that all transactions were carried out legally and formally, in a way that would secure his own interests as a tenant and prospective buyer."

Besides, the housing tenancy agreement was signed between Euphrosyne Lambropoulou, as representative of «Nobilis», and Tsohatzopoulos in January 2007. But the seized documents have receipts for renovations from September 2006.

According to the two prosecutors, Aik. Stamatis "proceeded to withdraw from her Emporiki Bank account the amount of 3,000,000 drachmas in one single day in 2001, which had been transferred from an account kept in the Bank of Cyprus by «Torcaso», with Zigras as its main recepient and A. Tsohatzopoulos as the real owner." However, "her only income since 1995 has been a disability pension received from the German State, amounting to 700 euros."

The position of Tsohatzopoulos’ daughter, Areti, is also particularly difficult as she is involved in the acquisition of the property on Dinokratous via the «Bluebell» offshore company.