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Death of an LGBTQ activist in Athens: two men sentenced to ten years in prison

2022-05-03T15:43:18.711Z


The Athens Assize Court on Tuesday (May 3) sentenced two men to ten years in prison each for beating and inflicting serious injuries...


The Athens Assize Court on Tuesday (May 3) sentenced two men to ten years in prison each for beating and inflicting serious injuries that led to the death Zacharias Kostopoulos, icon of the Greek LGBTQ movement, who died in Athens in 2018 at the age of 33.

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The court did not recognize mitigating circumstances for the two convicts and imposed the maximum sentence of ten years, provided for by Greek law, for the crime of "

bodily harm leading to death

", according to a judicial source.

Known by his drag-queen artist name "

Zak/Zackie Oh

", Greek-American Zacharias Kostopoulos, was a strong advocate for the rights of LGBTQ and HIV-positive people, like himself, and his death caused great emotion in Greece.

A “lynching”

On September 21, 2018, he was violently beaten by the two convicts, an owner of a jewelry store located in the center of Athens, which he allegedly tried to rob, according to the defense, and a real estate agent who had an office next to the jeweller's.

The victim managed to get out of the jewelry store through the broken window but in the street, the two convicts continued to beat him while passers-by in turn also punched him.

Police officers who arrived on the scene then beat and handcuffed him as he was bleeding on the sidewalk, according to a video that went viral on social media at the time.

The victim was pronounced dead a few hours later at a hospital where he was transferred.

The Greek LGBTQ community had made Kostopoulos' death a textbook case, arguing that his death was "

a hate crime

".

Amnesty International had described his death as "

lynching

" and "

murder

", criticizing the violence of the police intervention.

Read alsoLyon: investigation opened after the assault of a homosexual couple

On Tuesday, the Assize Court acquitted the four police officers who had also been on trial since October with the two convicted of the crime "

serious bodily harm leading to death

".

The trial was scheduled to start in October 2020 but it did not start until a year later due to the restrictions and confinement imposed to stem the coronavirus pandemic at the time.

The jewelry store owner, 77, is to serve his prison sentence at home under supervision due to advanced age, while the estate agent, 59, is to be transferred to prison, according to the court source.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2022-05-03

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