Man gets 20 years for double murder

FIFTY-SIX-year-old Charalambos Afxentiou was sentenced to 20 years in prison yesterday for the double murder of father and son Andreas and Charalambos Skyllouriotis outside their home in Mouttalos last year.

The Assizes Court in Paphos sentenced Afxentiou to 20 and 18 years imprisonment to run concurrently for the murder of 60-year-old Andreas and his 38-year-old son, Charalambos on July 13, 2002.

Taxi-driver Afxentiou shot both men at point-blank range over a parking space row while they were sitting on their veranda in Mouttalos village in Paphos.

Relatives were furious at the sentencing, and gathered outside the Paphos court to protest against the sentence, which they felt was too lenient. The younger victim’s brother argued it was a provocation of the court not to conclude the murder had been premeditated.

“We lost our father and our brother, who left six orphans on the street — all our families were destroyed. And we came here today to a fiasco. They gave him a 20-year sentence,” said a brother of Charalambos Skyllouriotis.

Afxentiou was escorted by police through the back door of the court to avoid the angry crowd of the victims’ relatives gathered at the entrance.

The row involved a parking space dispute between the father, his son and their neighbour, Afxentiou. Charalambos would reportedly park his car in a spot that the neighbour did not approve of. In an effort to prevent him from doing so, the 56-year-old placed a pile of stones in the parking space. But the son moved the stones and parked his car there anyway.

When Afxentiou found out, he got his shotgun, crossed the street and shot both father and son dead, in front of the latter’s 11-year-old son.

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