Suspect remanded after stabbing

A LARNACA man who allegedly stabbed his prospective son-in-law broke down and cried yesterday as Larnaca District Court remanded him for eight days on suspicion of attempted murder.

“Whether I stay inside for one day or one hundred years makes no difference to me,” suspect Andreas Demetriou, 48, tearfully told the court after Judge Leonidas Kalogirou asked him if he had any objection to the remand order.

Demetriou gave himself up to police on Friday following a knife attack on 26-year-old Sotiris Vassiliou at his Dhekelia home earlier that day.

Case investigator Andreas Ttofi told the court Demetriou had stabbed Vasiliou three times after an argument over the latter’s decision to get engaged to his second cousin Ioanna Demetriou – the suspect’s daughter. Ioanna witnessed the attack, the court heard.

“Everything went black, I don’t remember what happened. I only realised what had happened when my daughter started screaming,” Demetriou, who appeared in court with a bandaged hand, responded when he was asked by the judge if he had anything to say. Ttofi told the court that Vassiliou, who was rushed to Nicosia general hospital with stab wounds to his neck and leg, was not yet out of danger.

The suspect, who lives in Livadhia, went to the victim’s home at about 10am on Friday after having a row with Vassiliou’s mother at her workplace in Ormidia. He found his daughter at Vassiliou’s home and an argument ensued. The altercation escalated into a fight between the suspect and the victim during which the stabbing occurred, the court heard.

Ttofi said the suspect drove the bleeding Vassiliou to nearby Ormidia police station himself. Vassiliou was rushed to Larnaca hospital and then on to the Nicosia general.

Demetriou, a civil aviation employee, turned himself in at Ormidia police station a few hours later, Ttofi said.

The victim works for a phone company in Nicosia.

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