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In practice, the Court of Appeal ignored the report of expert Alexander Fischer, who had been called as an expert witness by the investigator and who had not recorded anywhere in his written statement that he had taken note of the document. According to the laws of the Supreme Court, expert reports are documents of particular importance because they contain valuable data for proving the truth. Therefore, they must be specifically cited in judicial decisions: "The report of this or that expert shows that... and the court takes this into account ...". The court did not do that in writing. Of course, Alexander Fischer was questioned as a witness and his opinion was heard. His testimony, however, does not cover the entire spectrum of topics documented in his report as an expert. So, if the court had not taken note of this report and convicted the defendants, we believe that the decision of the court is biased and should therefore be abolished.

Today, the Supreme Court has agreed to consider your complaint. What is the procedure in this case?

Today, we presented our arguments before the Supreme Court of Greece, because we believe that the decision of the Court of Appeal should be annulled due to the lack of translation and because of a groundless decision. The lawyers of the relatives of the victims responded. The prosecutor suggested that our appeal should be rejected but the Court has decided to consider it and it will announce its decision after about a month and a half, or two months.

Under Greek law, the limitation period for criminal cases is 8 years, which will expire on 14 August 2013 in the case of Cypriot Helios Airways. How could this affect the proceedings?

If our request for annulment of the decision of the Court of Appeal is accepted, the new administration of justice should be completed by then because the limitation period applies to the Court of Appeal. In its original form, it applied to the decision of the Supreme Court but this law was changed many years ago and now the limitation period applies to the Court of Appeal. If the Supreme Court annuls the decision of the Court of Appeal, a new panel of the Court of Appeal should be determined by 14 August to reconsider the case and issue a decision by this date.

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