The prosecutor in the Second Instance trial of 21 defendants implicated for their role in a deadly wildfire that claimed 104 lives in the East Attica seaside town of Mati in July 2018 is seeking guilty verdicts for 12 of the state and political officials standing in the dock.
In Mati and neighboring areas, 104 people were killed and dozens more were injured. The fire completely destroyed or damaged thousands of homes, while tens of thousands of acres of forest were also burned.
Prosecutor Stamatina Perimeni asked the Three-Member Misdemeanor Appeal Court in Athens to convict, among others, former fire chief Sotiris Terzoudis, his operational commander Vassilis Matthaiopoulos, the then disaster response coordinator Ioannis Fostieris and the head of the Fire Service’s emergency response line, Christos Golfinos.
Τhe prosecutor of the court, Stamatina Perimeni, began her speech today in the second-instance trial for Mati.
The prosecutor spoke of a huge lack of coordination in extinguishing the fire from the very first moments and essentially noted that the authorities who at that time had to make critical decisions – knowing the possibility that the flames could threaten a settlement – did not do so or if they did, they weighed the data incorrectly and gave priority to infrastructure (ed. she means the refineries in Kineta) and not to the protection of human life.
In her closing arguments on Thursday, Perimeni also sought guilty verdicts for former Attica regional governor Rena Dourou and Rafina-Pikermi mayor Evangelos Bournos, saying that the former failed to mobilize the civil protection mechanism as she ought to have done and accusing the latter of misinforming residents about the direction of the blaze.
The mayor of neighboring Marathonas at the time of the disaster, Ilias Psinakis, is among those against whom there is no compelling evidence of culpability, according to Perimeni.
The case was sent back to trial after the original verdicts were deemed too lenient; just six of the 21 defendants were ruled guilty and they were let off with a monetary fine, daily kathimerini.gr noted..
The defendants face misdemeanor charges, however, an imprisonment of up to 5 years maximum is not excluded, MEGA TV reported. If no verdict is issued within a year, there is risk that charges are written off.
