A court in Athens yesterday handed a six-year-suspended jail sentence to Dimitris Vrakatselis, the man who had been accused of killing the head of the Social Security Foundation (IKA) Yiannis Vartholomaios in a fit of rage 14 months ago.

The court accepted the prosecutor’s suggestion that Vrakatselis should be found guilty of the manslaughter of Vartholomaios rather than his murder.

The two men fought outside the apartment of Vrakatselis’s wife, Thomais, after her husband discovered she was having an affair with the late IKA chief. Medical evidence submitted to the court this week indicated that Vartholomaios had been hit over the head several times but that a heart problem from which he suffered had contributed to his death.

Vrakatselis was released on bail and has been barred from leaving the country. He must also regularly appear at his local police station once a month. The court also instructed prosecutors to investigate whether the wife of Vrakatselis and the private detective he hired, who notified him of the affair, should face charges.