Fortune teller fails to predict his own court appearance

By a Staff Reporter

A GREEK medium has been remanded in custody for six days by Nicosia District Court after police said they caught him in a Nicosia hotel room telling someone’s fortune for a fee.

Police told the court that 39-year-old Athanasios Zafirakis was with a female client of about the same age when they raided his room, and that they found another woman waiting in the hallway who had just had her fortune told.

The second woman reportedly told police that this was not the first time she had come to Zafirakis for a glimpse into the future, adding that she paid on average between £15 and £30.

Police confiscated a number of items from the suspect’s room, including stones with ‘the eye’ painted on them, Egyptian trinkets, porcelain shaped like garlic (said to avert the evil eye), £276, a phone book with a list of names and numbers in it, and other paraphernalia.

Zafirakis allegedly admitted being a medium and that he practises fortune telling, but insisted that he only accepts donations, not a specific sum, for his services.