Convict accused of cell cyanide death
An Albanian convicted for robbery and murder was charged yesterday with killing the last scion of an infamous Athens crime family, who died in January after eating cyanide-laced spaghetti in his prison cell. Korydallos inmate Ilis Perikou, 33, will be tried for the premeditated murder of Theodoros Grigorakos, 28, on January 28 in the southwestern Athens prison. Prosecutor Antonis Liogas also called for an investigation into the possible involvement of other people in Grigorakos’s killing. Grigorakos – who was in prison for attempted murder in connection with his family’s extortion racket – spent his last evening drinking prison-brewed spirits in his cell with another four convicts believed to have been among his trusted friends. Grigorakos also ate a helping of homemade spaghetti. Apart from Perikou, there were two Greek protection racketeers and a Bulgarian drug trafficker in the cell. Grigorakos felt unwell shortly after eating the meal, and died en route to the hospital. His death was originally attributed to alcoholic poisoning from the noxious prison brew. Perikou was allegedly the only of the four to have stayed with Grigorakos throughout the evening until lock-up, and was even alone in the cell with the spaghetti for about a minute. Police believe he slipped cyanide into the food, acting on instructions from other criminals. Grigorakos’s father and brother – whose family operations ranged from drug-smuggling to protection rackets – were both murdered in Athens within a few months of each other two years ago. Theodoros Grigorakos’s murder was the second this year in Korydallos. On February 7, Albanian bank robber Constantin Papa was found hanged in his cell. Two other convicts were charged with killing him.
