THE START of the trial into a suspicious land zoning case in Paphos, involving prominent developer Theodoros Aristodemou, was on Thursday postponed for November 14 to give defendants time to study the evidence before responding to the charges.
Aristodemou – founder of Aristo Developers – his wife Roulla, company designer Christos Solomonides, and former Paphos municipality engineer Savvakis Savva were arrested in September in connection with forgery and fraud in the demarcation of 177 plots of land in the area of Skali.
Defence lawyers requested a continuance because, as they said, they have not yet received all the evidence.
Prosecutors did not object to the request.
Judge Dora Socratous rescheduled the hearing for November 14 at 9am.
The defendants are free on bail, set at €100,000. They will have to report to police once a week.
The four are suspected of falsifying the development plans that showed reduced green areas and a road network in order to allow Aristo a larger area for development.
The excess development area meant a gain of some 2,700 square metres and hundreds of thousands in profit for Aristo.
The alleged crimes are believed to have been committed between February 3, 2010, and December 28, 2011.
If he can get representation from the panel of shysters who are recommended to prospective ‘clients’ of Aristo Developers; he may well end up with consecutive death sentences.
Whilst it may well be justifiable to take a cynical view of a postponement in a particular criminal trial, this procedure is not uncommon in the UK where, for a trial to proceed, the prosecution must first provide full Advance Disclosure of all the evidence on which it relies in bringing the case to court.
Courts will often grant a short adjournment to allow this to take place so that the Defendant cannot argue they did not know what case they were to answer. Prosecutors can, of course, object if they believe defence lawyers are deliberately using delaying tactics but in this instance they didn’t object.
@c findlay, well let’s hope not, after all Christodoulou a former central bank governor and finance minister got 5 months in jail for non disclosure of 1 million one of his companies received, this and a 13.5 K fine, peanuts really if you think about it, the interest he recieved on this 1 million far outweighs the titchy fine…..the punishments are too punitive….people will not be deterred from continuing the way they do.
When I read the headline I thought he’d developed high blood pressure and was recovering in Hospital. Wrong, this time; next time?………….
I would put money on it that the witness who provided damning evidence will be got at and this will all disappear in the mists of time.
Did you know that the legal system has another delaying tactic hidden away. You can be plead guilty and await your sentence whilst still on bail. You plead guilty all the way through the trail and then a week before you are due sentencing the system allows you to change your plea.
Yet another delay. We experienced this with our developer and guess what, after the retrial date was set he skipped the island and the case has now been shelved until he sets foot on the island again and is rearrested.
Crazy
Quelle surprise…
Must be posponed due to health issues that the normal excuse used to delay the legal process.
Well lets hope he gets what he is due, seems scam after scam is being unearthed, shoe boxes full of cash deposited at banks by couriers who worked for a high ranking official in the port authority…whatever next?