Policemen jailed for freeing prostitutes
A serving policeman and his former superior officer, who is now retired, were each sentenced to two and a half years’ imprisonment yesterday for releasing from their precinct cell four foreign women arrested for prostitution in June 1998. A Katerini court sentenced Savvas Sotiriadis, who was in charge of security at the Eleftherias Square police station in Thessaloniki at the time, after he was found guilty last year of freeing four foreign women arrested for illegal prostitution, along with Constantine Gavriilidis, who had been in charge of the premises where they worked. Also sentenced was Pantelis Kekeris, the former chief of the station. Sotiriadis said Kekeris had told him to release the four and destroy all evidence against them. Police witnesses at his trial said Kekeris told them his decision had been «on the spur of the moment after waking up.»
