Guilty verdict sought for officer
A prosecutor yesterday proposed that Epaminondas Korkoneas, the 38-year-old policeman accused of the murder of teenager Alexis Grigoropoulos in December 2008, be found guilty as charged, remarking that he saw no mitigating circumstances to warrant more lenient treatment. «Epaminondas Korkoneas was calm when he turned his gun toward Tzavela Street and fired twice,» Haralambos Lakafosis told the jury at the court in Amfissa, central Greece, hearing the trial of the two officers. The prosecutor also called for Korkoneas’s partner, 32-year-old Vassilios Saraliotis, who was on duty with Korkoneas, to be found guilty of complicity. Saraliotis «egged Korkoneas on,» Lakafosis told the court. If Lakafosis’s proposal is adopted by the jury and three presiding judges, Korkoneas faces life in prison while Saraliotis faces a 10-year jail term. The court is to convene again at the end of the month with a final ruling due in September. Basing his conclusions on hundreds of pages of testimony by witnesses, psychiatrists and the two officers, Lakafosis said the decision by Korkoneas to shoot without provocation was «unjustified and dangerous.» Korkoneas’s lawyer, Alexis Kougias, claimed the shooting was a «tragic accident» after his client fired warning shots to scare off youngsters throwing stones and bottles at them. The mother of the dead 15-year-old, Gina Tsalikian, said her son had not been among the group of youths. Tsalikian said the patrol car had initially been undamaged, according to witnesses, and that its windows were broken afterward to suggest there had been an assault. An autopsy indicated the teenager was hit by a bullet that ricocheted but several witnesses claim to have seen Korkoneas aim his gun and fire.
