Prosecutor calls for Sorras to be cleared of racketeering, convicted on fraud charges
The founder of the ultranationalist fringe part Convention of Greeks, Artemis Sorras, should be found guilty of the fraud charges brought against him but cannot be convicted for racketeering, a prosecutor said in the ongoing trial against the self-proclaimed trillionaire on Friday.
Sorras, the prosecutor told a criminal appeals court in Athens on Friday, was acting alone when he attempted to defraud the Greek state of billions of euros by claiming to be able to pay off the country’s national debt in exchange for low-rate returns and bonds as collateral.
“The action was never completed, regardless of his intentions, because the falseness of his claims was revealed,” the prosecutor said, pointing to an investigation by the Greek authorities into Sorras’ claims of having a fortune that would have ranked him among the world’s wealthiest individuals.
She also argued that the other 22 defendants should be cleared of participating in Sorras’ attempted fraud, as Sorras’ actions should not be seen as the actions of a criminal organization, but as “political actions, through which he attempted to achieve specific goal.”
Likewise, the prosecutor added, all 23 defendants should be cleared of money laundering as there is no proof to suggest Sorras profited from his ruse.
Sorras founded a nongovernmental organization in 2012 called End National Debt and claimed to have a fortune amounting to more than 2.7 trillion dollars from the “sale of space technology.”
He founded Convention of Greeks in 2015 and pledged to pay off every Greek’s debt to the state if he was elected to government.