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A 65-year-old Italian man has been arrested by Greek authorities in the Peloponnese on charges of killing his 54-year-old Greek partner, Maria, and the woman’s 26-year-old son, Olimpios. The man, who denies all charges, is in pre-trial detention in Korydallos prison, near Athens. This was reported by the state broadcaster Ert.
The arrest and the double murder
The man was arrested on June 10 in his home in Longos, a small coastal town in the northern Peloponnese overlooking the Gulf of Corinth. The double murder apparently occurred the previous day, June 9th. According to the first investigation by the medical examiner, the 26-year-old was hit in the head with a rifle while he was in bed and then suffered stab wounds; the mother’s body was found at the entrance to the house, with stab wounds.
The suspect’s version
The first to raise the alarm was the 65-year-old himself, who declared that he was sleeping in another room of the house at the time of the events and that he hadn’t noticed anything until he woke up, when he saw the two bodies. The man then alerted a neighbor and then called the police.
The findings on the scene
According to the Ana-mpa agency, among the seized objects are a knife found in a flowerpot, a hunting rifle with which the 26-year-old may have been shot, a t-shirt with traces of blood and several fingerprints. There are no signs of forced entry at the door. The Greek police also hypothesize that the crime scene may have been altered: small bloodstains were identified in several places which appear to have been the subject of a cleaning attempt, Ert reports.
The economic background
According to relatives and friends of the couple quoted by the Greek media (To Vima), in recent months there have been frequent arguments between the two for financial reasons. According to some testimonies, the 65-year-old would have contributed to the costs of renovating the house and would have asked his partner and her son to repay at least part of the money, after the woman had sold a piece of land and allocated the entire proceeds to her son, born from a previous marriage and who was studying in Germany.
«He wanted them to give him the money back so he could return to Italy. He wanted to leave her. They didn’t get along,” said the 26-year-old’s grandmother. However, the man rejected all accusations and denied tensions of an economic nature.