Who are the 10 people who will visit the investigator next week

A new chapter opens in the ongoing investigative process in the case of the acquisition of Akis Tsochatzopoulos’ assets which, according to the prosecutor's investigation, are a product of corruption from bribes for the German submarines and the Russian anti-aircraft TOR-M1 guns.

Next week, on April 25 to 27, investigator Gabriel Malis will hear the pleas of ten more people. In the coming days he will decide whether to proceed to additional prosecution of the former minister, if he will invite new people as accused and whether he will need to take new testimonies.

The people that will present their pleas next week are involved in the traffiking of black money as a product of corruption. It is money that was handled by offshore companies, allegedly with the imprisoned Nicholas Zigras, Tsohatzopoulos’ cousin as director. Subsequently, this money was laundered again to purchase real estate properties through the same companies, which always ended up with the former minister and members of his family.

These ten people are:

-          V. Stamati: she gained possession of the neoclassical house in Areopagitou for 1.1 million euros in April 2010. Initially the owner of the property was allegedly Torcaso and then Nobilis, behind which is Tsochatzopoulos according to the two prosecutors. The first installment of the loan of 650,000 euros collected by Stamatis was deposited in a Nobilis bank account to pay for the house. According to the two prosecutors the property was purchased with money which is the product of passive bribery on the part of the former minister.

-          P. Stamatis: is involved in the renovation of the neoclassical house and signs the relevant documents as Panagiotis Papaliakos using the surname of his former wife in order not to reveal that he is V. Stamatis' brother. According to the findings in at least one of these transactions he appears to be the representative of Nobilis.

-          Areti Tsochatzopoulos: she is involved with the building of 402 square meters at Dinokratous in Kolonaki. Allegedly she acquired it from Asterios Economides' Arcon construction company, who is already in custody regarding the same case. He bought the house from Bluebell, the manager of which seems to be Nikolaos Zigras. 16. 202.000 Swiss francs were remitted to the company’s account which prosecutors consider to be bribe money to the former minister for the supply of TOR-M1.

-          Catherine Stamatis: Torcaso deposited 3 million drachmas to her bank account in 2001. Zigras was the beneficiary of the company and the real owner was Tsochatzopoulos. However, since 1995 this account has received only her pension of just 700 euros.

-          Nikolaos Georgoulakis: for a period of time he was allegedly the owner of Nobilis. In the preliminary deposition, Lambropoulou admits that all this time during which Georgoulakis, an Hellenic-American dentist, appears as the owner of Nobilis, there were no documents showing any amount received from the sale of the property on D. Areopagitou.

-          Eftichios Atsopardis: was used as a representative of Bluebell in Greece during the transfer of the property at Dinokratous to Arcon in 2005. According to the findings, Atsopardis was "an employee of Morelia, and used by Zigras to conceal his relationship with Bluebell.

-          Pantelis Zachariades seems to have been a representative of Torcaso and is Zigras' best man. Lawyer Talita-Maria Tsekoura was the representative of Nobilis and had declared her office in downtown Athens as the company's headquarters. Oratios Melas and Konstantinos Antoniades, the Morellia owners, voluntarily presented themselves to the prosecuting authorities when informed by news stories that the company is involved in the distribution of the Ferrostaal bribes for German submarines. They had a professional relationship with Zigras and gave him their bank account numbers in order to help him.