Bank robbers caught with loot
Four dangerous criminals, including a former policeman and an escaped convict, have been arrested on suspicion of mounting an armed bank heist in southern Athens on Wednesday, police said yesterday. Robbers stole 94,120 euros during the attack on a National Bank of Greece branch in Hellenikon, and escaped on two motorbikes after a gunfight with police officers who reached the scene of the crime in a patrol car. Nobody was shot, though at least 15 bullets were fired at the officers. In their haste to escape, the robbers dropped a gun. Police, who had suspicions as to the robbers’ identities, eventually located the four suspects – former policeman Nikitas Mavrikis, 46, escaped convict Anastassios Moiurkoutas, 35, Panayiotis Dimopoulos, 38, and Dimitris Papadomichelakis, 34 – in a Kalamaki flat owned by Mavrikis. Officers who raided the flat confiscated the cash from the robbery, 10 guns and ammunition. The four are believed to have mounted a 27,000-euro armed robbery at a Moschato meat wholesaler’s on December 12.
