It seems that criminals in Athens are playing jokes. On April 1^st (the day of the joke) tied to each other, two robbers ran away from court during a bright and sunny day. A third criminal managed to rob a bank under the strict eye of the police in Palini neighborhood. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis called for a meeting, on which the main invited were the Minister of Justice and the deputy-minister of Internal Affairs, who is responsible for the public order.

Exactly at 01:00pm, two robbers, accused in stealing ?169 from a supermarket, managed to run away from the courtroom, where their case was supposed to be discussed. One of them is from Kazakhstan and the other one from Georgia. They arrived to the courtroom guarded by two policemen, who got distracted for a moment and the criminals ran away. The policemen are accused for participating in the runaway. Judge Eleni Traykou gave them 24 hour deadline to catch the runners and if they can’t, then they will have to give themselves in to the police. If in the meanwhile the runaways give themselves in, then the accusation against the policemen will be withdrawn.

Right now in the Athenian neighborhood Palini there is a huge police operation, because a criminal robbed a branch of First Bank and then ran away from the police. The authorities managed to besiege him in a construction site. They had the situation under control with two patrol cars and two helicopters. A little later the police entered the complex but found the clothes, bag with money, and gun of the man, who managed to run away. During the robbery, the man captured a girl as a hostage but released her not too long after that.

The Athens police had trouble last night as well when they had to chase after a car with two passengers inside, because they did not stop for a regular check-up. Finally, the police arrested the couple and it came out that the man is sought for two robberies and 14 robbery attempts.