A Larnaca police officer who was found guilty of encouraging someone to sell him drugs was ordered to resign on Wednesday, following a unanimous decision by a police disciplinary committee.
Officer Christakis Christodoulou, who worked with the traffic police had been fined €1,000 in January this year after being found guilty of trying to convince someone to sell him drugs in an apparent bid to frame his estranged former wife.
A member of the drug squad told court that in May 2012, he had received a text message from an unknown number, later traced to Christodoulou, that a Russian woman working at a supermarket had purchased cocaine and cannabis.
Her number plates and details of where she was parked were included.
Police tracked the woman down who agreed to have her car searched.
Two plastic bags of cocaine and three plastic bags of cannabis were found in her vehicle.
She suspected her former husband who had a copy of her car keys and had refused to return them to her.
A witness, whose testimony was key to court’s decision, said he knew Christodoulou from their army days and had run into him a few times at a specific bar in Oroklini.
On one occasion, the witness said, the officer had told him he was upset his wife had their child and was looking for a way to set her up so he could gain custody.
To that end, he tried to convince the man to sell him drugs, which the witness said he had refused to do.
Christodoulou had originally also faced charges of possessing class A and B drugs (cocaine and cannabis). These were dropped as there was no proof that could tie him to the allegation that he had indeed purchased any drugs or that he had been the one to place them in his former wife’s car.
The former wife said she had filed for divorce from Christodoulou after finding out he had a child with another woman. However after initiating divorce procedures, she discovered they were divorced her without her knowledge.
She then recalled her former husband pressuring her into signing many papers that were in Greek, which she could not read.
When finding out from authorities they were already divorced, she said she was incredibly shocked.
