REAL estate broker and property investor Kypros Kyprianou, 55, was sentenced to two years in prison for fraud on Wednesday.
Kyprianou, the director of Famagusta Developers, had been charged with selling the same property – a flat – in Paralimni twice in June 2010, collecting the amount of €100.000 from one buyer and €30,000 from another.
The court ruled that the defendant’s criminal record – which included a 1990 conviction to six years in prison over a similar case – warranted little lenience and handed Kyprianou a two-year jail sentence while imposing a €1.000 fine on Famagusta Developers.
The offence of fraud and the repeated pattern of intentional double-selling for profit were driving factors in the ruling, according to Judge Evi Antoniou.
“His plan victimised the two plaintiffs, and many others, and his professional conduct has discredited Cyprus abroad”, the judge said in her ruling.
Kyprianou had made headlines in 2010, when police put him on the stop list – banned from leaving Cyprus – as eight complaints for fraud had been filed against him, according to a police spokesman at the time.
This was just one of several cases against Kyprianou, filed against him by Cypriot and foreign buyers of his properties.
He is also facing multi-million lawsuits from various construction companies he had used.
In 1980 the defendant had set up Kyprianou Estates, and was reported to police for selling the same property twice.
Kyprianou fled the island before the police investigation was complete but was arrested in Germany and extradited to Cyprus where he was jailed. He was released in 2000 and set up business again.
I agree with Kal; how come a second offence – for the same type of fraud – ends up with a lesser sentence!
And, of course, he will quietly be allowed to leave after a few months: maybe even spend some of his time in ‘hospital’ with a sudden medical problem.
You are right Kal, its a bit like a no claims bonus but backward, like so many things here on Cyprus. Crime certainly pays and its tax free! He should be made to work with the homeless and hungry that depend on charity.
This fraudulent business practice is quite lucrative isn’t it?
6 years for the first offence and now 2 years for the 2nd offence, so if he does it again it will just be a slap on the wrist. I don’t believe it !!!
May he be the first of many :-)