Anastasia Balezdrova
After the daring attack on four DIAS police officers two of whom lost their lives the Greek police say it is a matter of honour to find and catch their attackers. According to police, the VOLVO jeep the criminals drove while committing the robbery of the pavilion and subsequently abandoned near the place of the shooting is indicative of their past. Police officers believe that the car connects the killers of the two young policemen with a bank robbery which was carried out on February 11 in a branch of the National Bank of Greece in the village of Aspra spitia, Boeotia district.
Police officers associate the yesterday attack with the bank robbery because the investigation conducted so far revealed that the registration numbers of the gray Volvo were stolen on January 17 this year from the northern suburb of Nea Eritrea. The perpetrators of the robbery in Aspra spitia also used a Volvo for their escape which also was stolen on January 17 from the representation in Nea Eritrea.
Eight cars were stolen from the store - four Volvos and four Audis. The police are investigating the possibility the perpetrators of the yesterday bloody assault to have used one of the other stolen cars, not excluding the possibility to have stolen another car.
The robbery in Aspra spitia happened at 8:00 am. The four perpetrators came to the bank by a white Mitsubishi van which was stolen from Moshato neighbourhood two days ago. They broke the side entrance with hammers and raided the bank. They threatened the employees with two AK-47 rifles and forced them to open the ATM from which they stolen around 150,000 euros. Then they stole another 100,000 euros from the cash boxes and escaped.
They had to stop later because the van broke. The four robbers stopped a Fiat Punto in which two young girls were riding. Threatened by weapons the girls got out of the car with which the criminals fled. The Fiat was found later about a kilometer away from the place of the robbery.
The new findings of the police investigation show that the four criminals had got in a Volvo, which was subsequently abandoned on the Athens - Lamia highway. Furthermore, they had rented a house in the village of Kiriaki, Boeotia district, which they used as hiding place before and after the robbery. According to the investigation, the robbers are probably of Albanian origin. Under investigation is the involvement of a Greek from Russia with a rich criminal record.
The fact that only five DIAS police officers and three motorcycles were involved in last night's chasing caused severe reactions in the ranks of their colleagues. Today they held a protest in front of the central police station in Attica, where they remained for half an hour to honour the memory of their colleagues who lost their lives yesterday.
At the monument of the fallen police officers the chairman of the union of police officers in the Athens area Yiannis Makris said that it is not possible attacks on policemen to happen so often in a European country. "Unfortunately, only motorcycled DIAS police officers took part in the chasing," he said and remarked ironically that the police "could not send police cars," which he noted are used for the protection of football players and managers of football clubs.
"We can imagine the conditions in the Greek police after the only police patrol that was sent broke and was unable to take part in the chasing," he said and stressed that despite the teams of patrol cars that were in the area of the chasing were ready to take part in it they were ordered to stay where they were.
Yiannis Makris stressed that the one or two weeks training of the officers of the specific squads is not enough to make them able to cope with the challenges of their work.
According to the deputy chairman of the union Antonis Lyakopoulos, 80 percent of the police vehicles are out of gear. The same is the situation with the motorcycles by which DIAS polices officers patrol. "At least 20 of the motorcycles in Attica are out of order. This means that 40 colleagues of ours were not in the street yesterday to help the officers who requested support." He said that in many cases police officers pay the repair of the patrol cars out of their pockets. "We have 2 patrol cars in the police station where I work. Yesterday I took one of them to a private service-station, where we replaced its tires with old ones left by a citizen who has changed the tires of his car with new ones. The other car is quite out of order."
Antonis Lyakopoulos said that after the closure of the cost inspection department at the police we "have no money for heating and even stationery."
It is not clear whether the other police services have been informed last night to take part in the chasing. If they were alerted, why didn’t they go? Only in Greece can happen to chase criminals only by motorcycles without the assistance of police cars.
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