In assigning responsibility for another omission that “resulted in the death of nine people at sea” to the then Deputy Chief of the Fire Department, Vassilis Matthaiopoulos, the District Attorney Panagiotis Maniatis proceeded on the second day of his hearing in the trial for the tragedy in Mati.

The prosecutor emphasized that Mr. Matthaiopoulos, for whom he has already pleaded guilty for his failure to mobilize the three vessels of the PS to carry out a search and rescue at sea, did not even use the three lifeboats of EMAK.

According to Mr. Maniatis, if Vassilis Matthaiopoulos had ordered the boats to be towed from Aspropyrgos where their facilities were, they would have been in Rafina within 45 minutes and would have provided useful work to the rescue. “They would help significantly” he stressed, asking that the then “number 2” of the Fire Department be found guilty for this act as well.

In his speech, Mr. Maniatis asked for the guilt of one more Fire Department officer, raising the number of then officers of the Corps that he considers should be sentenced to five. During his speech, he repeated that: “The biggest mistake in the event of that day was the lack of coordination among the Security forces operating in the area. It was not the lack of forces, but primarily the complete lack of central coordination.”

The public prosecutor has completed his deposition regarding the defendants from the Fire Department and will continue with the remaining defendants until approximately 1:30 p.m. when, as the president announced, the court will adjourn its session due to the traffic regulations for the mobilization of farmers.

The prosecutor pleaded guilty

  • of the then commander of the Eastern Attica Fire Services Charalambos Chionis, for whom he accepted the admission of the indictment that he did not properly utilize the ground forces and furthermore that he did not properly guide the firefighters operating in the field.

The accused had replaced the ground leader Nikos Panagiotopoulos, for whom he has already pleaded guilty, at 5:57 p.m., a time when the fire had gained enormous momentum. Therefore, according to the prosecutor, Mr. Chionis should not be found guilty for the act of failing to recommend an organized removal. “When he arrived, perhaps it would have been a mistake to ask for an organized removal.”

However, according to Mr. Maniatis, both Mr. Chionis and Mr. Panagiotopoulos did not ensure that the citizens were informed in time that the fire was approaching, a fact that he described as “unacceptable and unjustified”. According to the prosecutor, both officers should have contacted the relevant local authorities, but the two defendants made “a bad choice”.

As he said, they had a special legal obligation to inform and thus both should be charged with the additional act for their failure to inform, which contributed to the final result.

  • The discharge of officer Christos Lambris, who is mentioned in the indictment as an aerial coordinator on the FLOGA 1 helicopter, who is accused of not instructing the captain Christos Drosopoulos to remain above the fire for a little while longer, leaving the fronts without an aerial image. The prosecutor emphasized that the process proved that Mr. Lambris was not and did not exercise the duties of an aerial coordinator, but was only assigned to survey the area. In any case, Mr. Maniatis, analyzing the provisions of the law, said that no one has the right to give orders to the governor, who judges and decides based on fleeting criteria.
  • Accordingly, he requested an exemption for the governor Christos Drosopoulos for his improper decision to leave while still having fuel, according to the indictment. “It was not proven that the flight time was shortened,” said the prosecutor who added that it was not proven that the pilot showed “fleeing or evading … especially on that day when other, heavier aircraft like Chinooks, did not take off, due to adverse conditions.”
  • The discharge of the then commander of the Aerial Means Service of the Greek Air Force Giorgos Portozoudis, who is accused of not ensuring aerial surveillance and not recommending to the leadership of the Corps the operational utilization of the FLOGA 2 and FLOGA 3 helicopters.
  • According to the public prosecutor, the first omission charged against him has been dismissed, “as aerial surveillance was carried out”. Regarding the failure to make a recommendation to the leadership of the Fire Department, Mr. Maniatis ruled that it cannot be substantiated as a charge, as the legal framework that governs the duties of the accused does not define either a duty or an obligation to make recommendations to the heads of the Fire Department.
  • The discharge of Stefanos Kolokouris, then commander of the 1st EMAK, as, according to the prosecutor, he did not have the authority to order the transfer of the boats of his service, but only to execute the order of Mr. Matthaiopoulos “which was never given”.