Short Cuts
Porsche chase.William Dempsey, a 36-year-old gymnast, was remanded for trial yesterday in connection with a collision Friday which killed another driver, Michalis Panagopoulos, 34, and seriously injured Panagopoulos’s passenger, Maria Florou, 35. Florou, who is said to be Dempsey’s ex-girlfriend, testified that Dempsey had chased Panagopoulos’s car along the Athens-Lamia highway after finding out he was with Florou, and had rammed the car with his Porsche several times. Dempsey denies the charges. (18/9) Lost and found. Police in Katerini, northern Greece, have arrested a woman who claimed she had found an abandoned newborn baby outside her farmhouse. Eleni Economicou, 37, later confessed to police that the baby was in fact her own. Police said the woman, who has seven other children, appeared to be isolated and under great financial and psychological stress. She was charged with making a false statement and released. (19/9) Ashore. Nearly 300 exhausted Iraqi Kurds arrived in Igoumenitsa late Tuesday night after being picked up from a 25-meter wooden fishing boat adrift off the island of Lefkada. The some 291 illegal immigrants, including 48 women and 64 children, had been heading for Italy from Turkey when their boat, the Tanerim, developed engine trouble. The captain and crew, who abandoned ship in a dinghy, are still at large. (20/9) In memoriam. A ceremony will be held outside the US Embassy today for the victims of the terrorist attacks in the United States, two Cretan groups said yesterday. The gathering at 2 p.m. will be in memory of Ioanna Achladioti-Kokalaki, who worked on the 102nd floor of the north tower of the World Trade Center, the Cretan Association of New York and the Society of People of Kourna, Crete, said. The 27-year-old woman was from Kourna in the Hania prefecture. (21/9) Relativity theory. A 27-year-old man arrested a year ago for pretending to be a relative of actress Eleni Filini and released after paying off his sentence was arrested again yesterday on similar charges. Since 1993, Constantine Yialouris has allegedly been passing himself off as the son of various actresses and singers (such as Katerina Kouka and Katy Grey), members of Parliament and journalists, or as their business associates, in order to obtain favors or borrow money. (21/9) Throughout the week Prime Minister Costas Simitis made clear that Greece would stand firmly with the United States in the war on terrorism. There will be no compromise with terrorists and no tolerance, he said. Such a crime cannot go unanswered, he said. Members of his government, the opposition New Democracy party and some smaller groups stand squarely behind him. This represents more than 90 percent of the votes in the April 2000 elections. There is a grim realization that war may not be what we want but that if one has to be fought we know which side we want to be on. Only the Communist Party has continued bearing the grudge it has borne since British and American military assistance helped keep Greece in the Western camp after World War II, contributing decisively to the rout of Communist forces in the civil war of 1946-49.
