THE PLOT hatched to slay Sigma boss Andis Hadjicostis was “sealed with a kiss outside a rustic restaurant” in the Nicosia district, as a witness in the murder trial described it in court yesterday.
Fanos Hadjigeorgiou — who has received immunity from prosecution and placed in a witness protection programme in exchange for testifying against the other four defendants – said he personally witnessed the scene.
Under cross-examination in court yesterday, Hadjigeorgiou gave more details about a meeting of the alleged plotters that took place in late 2009 at the Tamasiana restaurant in the village of Pera Orinis.
Present at the meeting were: Andreas Gregoriou, the man said to have recruited Hadjigeorgiou; Elena Skordelli, a former TV show host and alleged mastermind behind the murder; and Skordelli’s brother Tasos Krasopoulis, owner of the restaurant.
During a previous court hearing this week, Hadjigeorgiou related how at that meeting Skordelli told the others she wanted her boss Hadjicostis dead. She and her brother allegedly offered the hitmen €50,000 each, plus a job for life at the network with a monthly salary of €2,000-€3,000.
After the meeting was over, Hadigeorgiou said, he saw Gregoriou walk up to Skordelli as she was preparing to get into her car, and kiss her on the mouth.
“Knowing how Andreas was with the ladies, I realised then that she was the woman who had been calling him and the one he was chasing after,” the witness said.
Asked by Gregoriou’s defence lawyer how long Gregoriou had been “chasing” Skordelli, he said the two had been talking for about two months before the murder.
The defence lawyer once again sought to discredit Hadjigeorgiou, asking the witness why he had not mentioned this before in statements to police.
Hadjigeorgiou, who has confessed to being the driver of the getaway motorbike, insisted he did not cut a deal with the state prosecution, and claimed he was offered witness protection only after police ascertained that the information he provided them was accurate.
Initially, he said, the murder plan provided for Gregoriou and himself to carry out the execution. But after Gregoriou was injured when a bomb went off in his car late in December 2009, Hadjigeorgiou had to find another man for the job.
While Gregoriou was in hospital, Hadigeorgiou said, he and others would take shifts standing watch over him and armed with a pistol.
The witness explained that once his shift was over, he’d hand the pistol over to the next man, unless it was someone whom he was not familiar with, in which case he’d give it to the bed-ridden Gregoriou who would hide it in his hospital room. The whole arrangement was taking place while Gregoriou was under police guard.
After the hit on Hadjicostis, said Hadjigeorgiou, he grew increasingly worried about not having properly disposed of the murder weapon. Gregoriou promised him he would “take care of it.”
The trial continues.
