15th meeting 19/01/2006

Where are the decisions taken, in the court or somewhere else? This was the question the court was confronted with at the beginning of this meeting. It was placed by Yianna Kourtovic, in relation to the compulsory appointment of advocates for Yiotopoulos. The court has said that it picked advocates from the annual list published by the Lawyer's Association in Athens, ignoring the questions of defence advocates about the fact that the law has changed and now the Lawyer's Association in Athens draws up a monthly and a weekly list, from which the courts should name the advocates maintaining absolute alphabetical order. Yianna Kourtovic addressed the Lawyer's Association in Athens, who replied with a document that the advocate read and deposited to the court. The document says that the lawyer’s association in Athens has only drawn up an annual list of lawyers who have declared that they wish to be included in the beneficiary free legal help (irrelevant to the particular affair). For compulsory nominations, it says it has drawn up and has published to the heads of all courts a weekly list. The list from which this court should have picked advocates for Yiotopoulos was published on the14th of December - but was not used by the court. The annual list the court claimed to have used never existed.

The public prosecutor declared she believed there is no issue she needs to comment on!

This led to the astonishment of Yianna Kourtovic, who asked how it could be possible that the court is not interested in the illegal nomination of advocates and in contrary declares that it has no such concern,

Dimitris Koufontinas also intervened at this point and said

"Is it possible you are not concerned with this issue? In the beginning of the process you asked - he said addressing in the chairman - for meekness; however what I see is that you have ignored even the formalities let alone your own laws. This poses a serious threat to your integrity as well as the integrity of the prosecutor."

Yiorgos Gountoynas defence advocate for Savvas Xiros while being interrupted continuously by the chairman, declared that he was authorised by his client to make a statement in court on his behalf, and to submit an application of suspension of the implementation of his sentence. The chairman did not allow him to read the content of the application, the public prosecutor declared - in a provocative way - that certain advocates were trying to delay the trial and that the advocate of Savvas Xiros should submit the demand of suspension of the implementation of the sentence to the Public Prosecutor’s office of Appeals and not to the present court and therefore the demand should be rejected. The court rejected the demand.

This means almost blind and almost deaf Savvas Xiros, continues to remain in prison, without no healthcare and unable to attend the trial in his state and therefore abstains. Then Hippocrates Milonas, advocate of Vassilis Georgatos, submitted an objection on the illegality of the summoning crit of his client on the grounds that it requires the description of the offences for which the defendants are summoned rather than a general list of laws being broken so that the category is precise and it allows the preparation of the defence. Despite the thorough argumentation of the advocate the public prosecutor, without any reference to the argument made, asked for the rejection of the objection. The court rejected the objection.

Immediately and without a break, the court started on one of the most important objections that concern the nullity of the initial pleas of defendants. We will be reporting analytically as soon as the relative discussion is completed.