In extreme scenes of jealousy, a man proceeded against his student wife, as he thought she was having an affair with one of her professors. The man was found guilty of domestic violence from Areopagus.
Specifically, according to protothema.grthe Areopagites were concerned with the case of a couple where he had been blinded by jealousy of his student wife, to the point that forced her to withdraw from the University of Athens because she believed she was having an affair with one of her teachers.
He went with her to the University, hit her with a helmet
On the day her husband took her to university, she again made a scene of jealousy over her alleged love affairs. She denied for the umpteenth time that she had relations with a professor, but he was once again not convinced. Thus, by guile injured her with the motorcycle helmet that he was wearing.
The case was brought repeatedly to the courts, since he was prohibited from cursing her and behaving violently with injunctions.
He forced her to withdraw from the University
They married for love very soon after they met and settled in the husband’s house in Attica. A month after the wedding and after being pressured, they took the motorbike he was driving to the secretariat of the Kapodistrian University of Athens, where the girl was studying.
According to the decision of the Supreme Court, they started going to the university “in order to be informed about the documents required for deletion from her studies, a decision taken by the student following his imposition.
While returning to their home on his motorcycle, moving in the center of Athens and specifically on Panepistimi Street, during an episode of jealousy, which the husband had already started from the university premises, accusing her of having an affair with a professor in the past of her school, there was an argument and an intense fight between them, mainly due to the husband’s insistence that the student admit the relationship with her professor, even though the latter assured him that such a thing never happened”.
Nevertheless, the jealous husband was not convinced even then “he hit his wife hard and on purpose twice in the face with the back of his head and caused her – as she was not wearing a protective helmet – simple physical damage and specifically an ecchymosis of the upper and lower right eyelid”. After her injury, she went to the Attica hospital to receive medical assistance, and she also received a relevant certificate for her injury.
The condemnation
As expected, the case went to court. The three-member Court of Appeal of Athens ruled that the husband “carried out the criminal act of domestic physical harm attributed to him”, i.e. the violation of Law 3500/2006 “on dealing with domestic violence”. Eventually, he was found guilty and sentenced to prison one year with a three-year suspension.
Appellants denied the husband’s request for post-offense mitigation to reduce his sentence.
The request for recognition of mitigation was rejected by the Court of Appeal on the grounds that “the concept of subsequent good behavior is not established, since he continued to harass his wife and only after the issuance of a temporary injunction, following the request for injunctive measures by her ex-wife, he was obliged to stop any derogatory (abusive or violent) behavior towards her”.
After the appeal decision, the husband appealed to the Supreme Court, requesting that the judgment against him be annulled. In front of the Areopagits, he argued that the appeal decision does not have a full and detailed justification as to his guilt, as required by the Constitution and the criminal legislation.
He further argued that he was not granted the mitigation of subsequent good conduct, although since then “he has not bothered, nor confronted his ex-wife again” and even paid her the amount of 24,512 euros awarded against her by the civil courts. He also claimed that he is “only engaged in his work, his artistic activities, such as painting, and his sports activities.”
Furthermore, he claimed that “he has not concerned the judicial authorities and has not fallen into any violation of the law, nor has he been accused of anything in the same period of time”, while he is helping with a social-philanthropic project at an institution in Attica.
The 6th Criminal Division of the Supreme Court rejected his appeal also in terms of the charge, judging that the appellate decision has the required full reasoning.
On the contrary, the Areopagites accepted the annulment of the appellate decision regarding the part of the non-recognition of a mitigating factor and referred the case in this regard for a new judgment to the Court of Appeal of Athens.
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