How Brit’s Ayia Napa ‘rape lie’ case became a shambles – from false confessions to Israelis’ friends in very high places
THE case of a young Brit tourist found guilty of lying about a gang rape in Ayia Napa is mired with claims of shocking injustice.
The unnamed 19-year-old gap year student has been warned she faces up to a year in jail when she is sentenced in a Cypriot court later next week.
However, a close study of the high-profile case paints a worrying picture of a vulnerable teen stranded 2,000 miles away from home being pressured by cops.
Many are quick to point out she was found guilty just days before Cyprus and Israel were due to sign a £4 BILLION gas pipeline deal in Athens.
It’s also been reported some of those originally arrested over the gang rape claims have friends in high places in their homeland.
Legal experts on the holiday isle and in the UK have now raised serious concerns over her prosecution with one leading barrister saying it “reeks of injustice”.
Her shocking ordeal started when she travelled to the notorious party resort in July after booking a working holiday package deal.
However, within days of landing on the resort island, her dream break in the sun had turned into a real-life nightmare.
After hooking up with a 21-year-old Israeli she claims she was brutally gang raped by her holiday fling’s mates.
It was the start of a “horrific ordeal” which would see HER end up behind bars.
Here are ten ways the teen was denied justice in a trial that has been branded a shambles:
1. THE POLICE
The girl tearfully told cops she had been gang-raped by 12 Israelis on July 17 last year.
Cypriot police arrested the men, with the teen set to fly home to the UK with her family.
But cops privately warned her she should stay or see the prosecution dropped – and asked her to sign a statement to that effect.
Eleven days later, on July 28, police asked her to be re-interviewed as a witness.
Yet in a screeching U-turn, detectives told her she was now a suspect for faking her entire story.
Incredibly, the girl was denied a lawyer – a breach of her human rights – and was told her friends would be arrested unless she signed a statement retracting her claims.
The family are also furious at leaks to Israeli media from Cypriot cops, including the girl’s name.
The crime scene was also not locked down, with TV crews allowed into the grimy room within hours.
Sources have told The Sun no DNA swabs were taken from the girl’s fingernails, knees or ankles, where she claimed to have been held down by her attackers.
DNA was also found inside the girl from suspects who had denied any contact whatsoever.
Critically, cops did not order any internal examination of the girl despite blood being found.
2.THE ‘SHAMEFUL’ JUDGE
The shambolic court case at Famagusta District court was presided over by Judge Michalis Papathanasiou who terrorised proceedings with angry outbursts against the British teenager and her legal team.
He would lose his temper when the girl looked out of the window or simply gestured to her female lawyers.
Incredibly, The Sun can also reveal seven videos of the alleged attack were submitted by the prosecution – but four of them related to other women.
The judge would repeatedly shout in Greek: “Show respect! Face the front, you must respect this court!”
At one point a woman court worker advised the teenager to keep her face expressionless.
She added: “I know it is hard but he’s just looking for an excuse to get angry.”
Expert witness Dr Marios Matsakis, who examined the girl’s medical reports, says: “The judge was shouting, he was aggressive. It was shameful.”
3. DELAYS
The British girl was accused of Public Mischief – a relatively minor crime in Cyprus.
But, because of Judge Papathanasiou’s bizarre behaviour, a case that should have lasted a matter of days has dragged on for more than five months.
On six occasions the Briton’s hearing was halted while the judge paraded a stream of petty criminals into the courtroom to deal with their cases – something that is unheard of in British justice.
4. BAIL
Even though she fist appeared in court at the end of July, the case did not get going properly until October 2.
In that time she shared a cell in a Nicosia prison with nine other women.
When Judge Papathanasiou promptly adjourned the case again for two more weeks, the teenager had a panic attack in the dock.
Appeals for her bail conditions to be relaxed to allow her to return to the UK were dismissed. The courts kept her passport and she was not allowed to leave Cyprus.
5. PTSD
Because of the seemingly-endless trauma of the case, the defendant suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.
The hearing was delayed yet again on November 1 for the case to be moved to a larger court in Larnaca where there were facilities to take a Skype call from a psychologist in the UK who diagnosed PTSD.
6. WITNESSES
Back at Famagusta district court, the judge dismissed all of the defence witnesses, claiming they were unreliable.
Those ‘unreliable’ witnesses included a respected Cypriot forensic expert who concluded that her injuries were consistent with being raped.
Another expert testified that the “retraction statement”, which cops insisted the girl had written herself, could not have been penned by a native English speaker.
But Judge Papathanasiou ruled that every one of the prosecution’s witnesses were ‘credible’. At other times, the judge limited the girl’s lawyers to just ten minutes of cross-examination.
Meanwhile, in one farcical exchange, the prosecutor tried to claim the girl’s injuries were caused by a jellyfish sting.
7. LAWYERS
When the case began, with the girl in handcuffs, her own Cypriot lawyer Andreas Pittadjis tried to discourage interest in the case by telling journalists: “You don’t need to come back. It’s not a big story.”
He was sacked by the girl’s family and replaced by two respected human rights lawyers Ritsa Pekri and Nicolette Charambidou.
Bizarrely, state prosecutor Adam Demosthenous refused to give his name to the press covering the case.
He later branded her testimony that she had been pressured into making a false retraction as ‘childish lies’.
8.REFUSED TO DISCUSS RAPE
Throughout the five-month case the judge refused to hear evidence about whether rape took place, which campaigners argue made the trial a farce.
Judge Papathanasiou constantly asserted: “This is not a rape case. I will not consider whether she was raped or not.”
He described her as an “unreliable witness” who had “repeatedly lied”.
The judge said: “She knows that she was never raped and she gave false statements. The guilt of the accused is proven. She confessed her guilt.”
In contrast he said police testimony was “honest and truthful”.
9.THE MAYOR
After an early hearing, the Mayor of Aiya Napa, Yiannis Karoussos, threatened to sue the British woman for defamation unless she apologised for claiming she had been raped.
At that point she had not even entered a plea.
10.TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE
Ex-MP Ann Clwyd, a former member of the House of Commons foreign affairs committee, says: “It looks like a travesty of justice. It seems to me to be far from fair.”
And three former justice ministers of Cyprus agree.
One of them, the island’s ex attorney general, believes it was not in the public interest to charge the young woman.
He says: “The legal system appears to be crushing a 19-year-old tourist, leaving her stranded in Cyprus for five months.
“A girl with no criminal record, who had never committed a criminal offence, forbidding her to leave the country, forcing her to resort to public fundraising to survive.”