NEWS

Prosecutor asks court to find Theofilou guilty of murder during Paros bank robbery

The prosecutor in the trial of a 31-year-old man accused of killing a taxi driver on the island of Paros in 2012 while conducting an armed robbery recommended on Tuesday that judges find him guilty.

Theofilou is also alleged to have links to the Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire urban guerrilla group.

He is accused of being part of a group of robbers who tried to hold up an Alpha Bank branch on the Cycladic island in August 2012. During the raid 53-year-old taxi driver Dimitris Michas was shot as he tried to stop the gang.

Theofilou is also facing charges of belonging to Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire and of illegally possessing weapons.

“We have on the stand a young man with an exceptionally high intellectual level and IQ,” the prosecutor said in her summation, arguing that the robbery had helped Theofilou rise in the ranks of Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire, four members of which have already been convicted for carrying out a series of bloodless bomb attacks in 2009 and 2010.

Theofilou has denied all charges, arguing that he was not in Paros at the time of the robbery. He has also said that while he is an anarchist, he denies membership of the Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire.

In August 2012, Theofilou was found guilty of resisting arrest and sentenced to a 15-month suspended term.

His murder trial began in November.

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