Murder of a contractor in Rhodes: New video of the last moments of the 46-year-old

The last moments of the contractor who was murdered in Rhodes see the light of day through a new video.

The victim’s movements, before meeting a dramatic end, are captured in a video shown on Alpha’s ‘Tlive’ show.

It is recalled that the 46-year-old contractor was murdered, on August 28, in Faliraki, Rhodes, outside the rented rooms owned by the confessed 53-year-old perpetrator.

Father and son remanded for contractor’s murder – ‘Rot in jail’

The 53-year-old owner of an accommodation in Faliraki and his 20-year-old son, who are accused of premeditated homicide in a calm state of mind with complicity, of the building contractor Tsanis Topali, were adjudged temporary prisoners on Saturday, after their confession, by a unanimous decision of the Investigator and the Prosecutor’s Office of Hamit, 46 years old, father of three minor children.

According to dimokratiki.gr, both defendants, apologizing in the presence of their lawyers Mr. Aki and Dimitris Dimitriadis and Dimitris Verberis, claimed that the 46-year-old’s death was due to an accident during a fight, arguing that it apparently resulted from his falling to the ground while he was stunned with a rope around his neck. They also pointed out that the 20-year-old is not to blame for this. The 53-year-old also commented thoroughly on the medical examiner’s report.

The bringing of the two defendants to the courthouse took place, as the “democratiki” wrote, under draconian security measures.

A group of enraged compatriots of the victim, specifically gathered early outside the courts and when the two defendants arrived, they cursed, asking them to “rot in prison”. The commander of the 1st Police Directorate of Dodecanese, Mr. Manolis Kazamias, tried to calm the spirits.

Speaking to the “demokratiki” the president of the Albanian Community of Rhodes, Mr. Aris Kasapi, stated that with the gathering they wanted not only to express their indignation at the murder of the 46-year-old but to demand the exemplary punishment of those responsible.

“We gathered as people, as countrymen of the victim to send a message, to demand the real punishment of those people who took his life. This is a heinous crime and what we are asking for is that Justice be served,” said Mr. Kasapi, while mentioning that next week a large rally is to be held in Rhodes by the Albanian community in collaboration with the island’s unions. As Mr. Kasapi mentioned, the goal of the rally is not only to spread the message about the exemplary punishment of those arrested, but also to teach young children that people’s differences should not be resolved in such … extreme ways.

The apology of the 53-year-old

The 53-year-old apologizer expressed his sincere condolences to the family and relatives of the deceased.

The 53-year-old, father of 4 children mentioned, in his family status, he pointed out that he is religious and that he visits Mount Athos at regular intervals and that he has never been accused of any criminal act.

Referring to his relations with the 46-year-old victim, he repeated that he met him as a construction contractor and they worked together several times as he was consistent and good at his work. One of his daughters is a classmate of the 46-year-old’s daughter and several times he had picked her up from school, while he has eaten with them.

In 2019, the 46-year-old, as he said, undertook and carried out repair work on the rooms he maintains, for which they agreed to pay him a total of 100,000 euros, in installments, even signing a relevant agreement, while also giving him an advance payment of 25,000 euros. Due to the pandemic that also affected the tourism industry, in the years 2020 and 2021, the work did not develop well and he was not able to fully repay him, but he gave his best.

But in the year 2022, when work returned to the levels of the pre-coronavirus era, he said, he paid off the debt in full with partial payments in July and August, paying him a total of 124,152 euros. He claimed that in addition to the principal owed, he also paid an amount for interest and for the agreed penalty clause. He added that for every amount he collected he signed himself and as he claims he was paid in full.

In fact, their professional collaboration was developing, since they had come to an agreement to undertake the construction of an outdoor swimming pool in the business, a project he had planned in order to upgrade the rooms.

For the execution of the related works, he himself, as he claimed, had signed a relevant responsible declaration, in which he requested the payment of an advance payment of 30% in order to start the works. For the disputed day of August 28, 2022, he claimed that he was calling him early so that they would sign affidavits about the project and also get some money as an advance after they signed.

She told him to go to the accommodation at 11.30 but he didn’t show up and she called him at 2.30 and wanted to meet but because she realized he was drunk she avoided him and asked him to meet the next day. She claimed that when the 46-year-old consumed alcohol, he became irritable, aggressive, cursed and threatened. He claimed that he called him again at 4:30 p.m. and was pressuring him to meet, and as he said, he avoided him, telling him that he was going with his daughters and his wife to the festival of Saint John in Kalythies. He continued to call him and at one point, while he was at the fair, he answered his call and he said due to the alcohol, he was particularly aggressive, swearing at him and threatening him.

At about 10:40 p.m., his son, who was at the bar at the time, called him on his cell phone and told him that the 46-year-old, in a state of rage, had gone to the forecourt of the business, next to the rooms, that he was very drunk, that he was playing with his car lights, that he was honking, shouting and cursing. He left his wife and daughters at the fair and hurried to the business. Arriving, he headed to the bar area where the 46-year-old was waiting and, as he described, started swearing at him and threatening to give him 500 euros, and he tried to calm him down and while the situation seemed to be calming down, he became even more aggressive.

He claimed she went to hit him with spoons and grabbed him by the throat. His son tried to pull his hands away, but he confused him more and he allegedly slapped him in the face and then punched him in the ribs.

The 53-year-old claims he was told to go out to the parking lot to explain, that there was a fight that started outside the reception desk in front of the rooms and ended up in the garbage cans. His son tried to separate them and the 46-year-old hit him again. The 53-year-old said he chased his son away and during the struggle he managed to land a powerful punch on the side of his head, causing him to be temporarily dazed. His farm car was parked there and a rope was left in the cart. Instinctively, he described it, he grabbed it and while he was dazed, put it around his neck to immobilize him. He was trying to free himself, pulling on the rope and at the same time pushing him, his body towards the uphill alley behind the bins. He was pulling the rope to stun him. At some point, she felt that she was no longer resisting, and then she loosened the rope and he fell hard to the ground, apparently passed out.

Then as he claimed, he found that he had hit his head. The ground there, he said, is rough and has scattered stones from the beach and that after he fell, he stopped reacting.

She checked his pulse and made sure he was dead and unresponsive. He called his son because he didn’t know what to do and he, shocked, told him that some friends of his would arrive at the accommodation shortly with whom he would go for a walk and the 53-year-old told him to leave with his friends.

The 53-year-old described how he grabbed the body and dragged it behind the bins out of sight, then returned to the fair to take his daughters and wife home. Just before they started to leave the fair, he called his son to tell him to come home.

He then waited for everyone to sleep, called his son, gave him the keys to the 46-year-old’s jeep to leave it in Kalythies in the area of ​​Agia Paraskevi and follow him with his vehicle. They left the 46-year-old’s car and went back, sat for a while at the bar and then the 53-year-old loaded the lifeless body of the 46-year-old into his truck with the help of his son, covered the body with a sheet and put a piece of wood on top.

He drove to Psinthos, on the way he dropped off his son, entered a dirt road and dumped the body in a ditch and threw stones on top.

She claimed she never wanted to kill him and as the incident unfolded she lost it and didn’t know how to handle it.

He emphasized that there was no deception, that he was attacked first by the 46-year-old and that the contractor was drunk, while toxicological tests are also awaited.

He also commented on the forensic report, stressing that compression fractures, as stated in the forensic report, without their radial extension to the surrounding bone structures, cannot exist. A fissured fracture should be established in the cranial pedestal, while he added that the appointed medical examiner seems to be speculating the result of the injuries without documenting it, therefore “severe brain injuries are expected, but it is not possible to establish”.

He pointed out that the truth of his claims about the injury caused by a fall and not by eating on purpose is also proven.

The apology of the 20-year-old

When the 20-year-old son testified before the Investigative Service, he confirmed what his father told, saying that when the fight was going on, he saw his father and the 46-year-old on the ground on the uphill road, approximately towards the end of it, where there is a deserted house. He approached and saw that the 46-year-old was on his back, motionless, and noticed that he had a dark rope around his neck. His father told him that while he was pulling him, he fell down with a force.

When they took the cars and the 46-year-old, as the 20-year-old said, he asked his father if they were going to the hospital and he did not answer. When he dropped him off near where he dumped the body he went over to see what he was doing and saw the farm car empty, with the bloody sheet behind and his father down in a ditch and the 46-year-old lying face down without moving.