THE BEST man of convicted rapist and murderer Antonis Prokopiou Kitas yesterday told the Nicosia district court that he had never witnessed his friend placing a bet or gambling during his stay at the Apollonion private hospital two years ago.
The witness, who has been a horse trainer for the past 30 years, told the court that he and Kitas struck up a friendship while the duo did a stint in prison the 1980s.
“We became friends and then family friends and I visited his home in Athienou,” the horse trainer said.
“Then in 1993, I think, he was jailed for life. We still maintained contact and I visited him in hospital. In the spring of 2006 he got married to his Chinese wife… He asked me to be his best man at their civil wedding in Aradippou.”
He said Kitas had started to complain of stomach pains in 2008 and was later admitted to the private Nicosia hospital for treatment.
“When he was at the Apollonion I visited him there four or five times. His wife was always there and it was around noon. He said he wanted to go to Greece for an operation because he didn’t trust the doctors in Cyprus. At the Apollonion, there were always two uniformed guards outside his door. They recognised me but whether they recorded my name in a visitors’ book I can’t say,” he added.
Looking uncomfortable on the stand and wearing a short-sleeved shirt with tattoos up and down his forearms, the burly Paliometocho horse farm owner said his two sons, who were also in the horse racing business, had nothing to do with Kitas.
He also said Kitas had often asked him for horseracing predictions but that he had advised him that betting was a bad idea because for every one time you won, you lost ten times.
“One time, I told him to bet on my mare because she was racing. When I visited him, he said he had. Where he placed the bet and how much he won, I don’t know,” he said.
However the witness said he had never physically seen Kitas placing a bet or gambling.
“I saw him once more in October 2008 and we spoke a few times. I have not seen him since he escaped and have no contact with him,” he added.
The testimony was given as part of the ongoing trial involving suspended Central Prison warden Michalis Hadjidemetriou and his part in Kitas’ escape from the private medical facility in December 2008. The convict was apprehended several weeks later following an island wide manhunt.
