With these phrases, Angeliki Nikolouli predicted the dark case that she first introduced to Tunnel in December 1997, a few days after the disappearance of businessman George Nicolaides and his collaborator Soula Kalathakis.
No one at that time could imagine the revelations that followed, that moved the viewers. The journalist, with her persistent and methodical research, for eight whole years gave a tough struggle against many obstacles to reveal the truth.
This case of the double murder, as it turned out, has returned to the news after viewers request to see where are and what are saying today the tragic protagonists of yesterday .
The multicolored thriller that shone on “Tunnel” unleashed a gang from good families who had planned the kidnapping of the businessman for his money and credit cards pins, which resulted the double murder …
It took seventeen broadcasts and one marathon in Greece, Italy and England to capture the gang’s “mastermind” and to give justice.
The tangle began to unfold when Soula’s mother, Kaiti Kalathakis, who believed that something else was hiding behind her daughter’s disappearance, turned to “Light at the Tunnel”. With the help of viewers seventeen days after the disappearance, the abandoned car of the businessman in Kifissia was spotted in the night. The paraphernalia that the perpetrators had left in the car, “spoke” about murder …
The macabre findings …
In the afternoon of 9 April 1998, a shepherd identified in Sesi Grammatiko area, the dismembered corpse of a woman, beaten by the dogs.
Between shrubs, in a brown jacket, they discovered a female skull with peeled long hair and the bones of a hand cut at the elbow. On one finger there was a silver ring. Within a few meters, two female black boots with pieces of trouser fabric were found. The tragic mother of the unfortunate Soula recognized the findings.
Three days later, police found in a bushy area in the same spot the corpse of a man, scabbed by large stones. He was normally dressed, but the clothes were worn out. A strip was torn around his head, torn from his shirt, which closed his mouth. His hands were tied to the wrists with pieces from his tie.
The shows that followed an incredible plot began to unfold before the eyes of viewers. A bloody dance of millions, luxurious trips abroad, forgery and scams …
Information began to arrive after the other in the studio. In Kifissia, was living the girlfriend of the “mastermind”, who was the recipient of the gifts the actor bought with the victim’s cards. The show had found the shops where purchases were made, and customer descriptions opened the way. Fake identities, wigs, fake travel in Italy, golden life with the victim’s cards, and letters of credit from many millions of banks were the puzzles of criminality.
When the amateur video-documentary of his exact life was shown on the show, the “mastermind” did not hesitate to call in the studio to stop the broadcast. His indifferent attitude towards the two dead caused the journalist’s anger and the conversation between them remained indelible in the memory of viewers.
Diplomats thriller …
He was arrested later in England, but British lawyers blocked his release in Greece. There followed a new diplomatic thriller starring an active Judge who pressed for his extradition and a persistent journalist. Angeliki Nikolouli.
In spite of the threats, she testified for days in the multicolored case trial as the main witness of the case, presenting voluptuous files with evidence brought to light by her research.
The court imposed a life sentence of 25 years for the gang’s “mastermind” and 25 years for another one. The rest of the company was acquitted. The Court of Appeals retained the penalties imposed at first instance.
Corfu: He killed his grandfather and aunt after the treat…
All these years has not been arrested the notorious “doctor” who allegedly took part in the killings. He had been escaped from prison where he was for killing his grandfather and aunt and never returned.
Another double murder with an assailant himself in February 1985, then shocked the local community in Corfu.
“Doctor” at a young age did not hesitate to take away his grandfather’s life and his aunt’s.
“Tunnel” sought out his relative in his native town of Corfu. Even after so many years, memories remain intense.
“The people who murdered were helping everybody. The one who so coldly took away their life did not live on the island. He stayed in Athens with his mother, “said his relative.
The police officers were then traced him as they did not find any signs of a violation at the house and felt that the crime had been committed by someone known to the victims. Doctor arrived on the island with the afternoon flight and went to his grandfather and aunt. They welcomed him and offered him a treat … Shortly before midnight, he executed them with a knife … The same day he re-entered the plane and returned to Athens. Later he told police officers that the reason he killed them was financial and property disputes.
“We learned later that he was sentenced to life imprisonment, but on a leave he left and never found him again. This is our justice system … “, said his relative to ” Tunnel “.
From the personal record of Angeliki Nikolouli, a letter was sent out to the investigator by the so-called “doctor” while he was wanted.
In this letter he reports that he arrived at the first crime because of a tragic conflict.
In an attempt to curb witness who claimed they had seen and described him, he stressed that no one had mentioned the fact that he was kneeling from one foot because he was infected when he was a child by acute polio.
He also claimed that he knew only one of those involved in the case as they co-existed for a while in the same prison, but never came back into contact with him after his leave was violated.
He argued that while he was a prisoner he took out fake documents to live away from prison. In conclusion, he gave the honor of saying that he had absolutely nothing to do with the death of Nicolaidis – Kalathaki.
Alas if society has such beasts …
Kaiti Kalathaki, at the first court of the extreme case, was coming face-to-face for months with those responsible for her daughter’s improper death.
Her own testimony lasted three hours. Her endeavor to endure was great. She took deep breaths and, with all her strength, she continued to answer the questions she had asked, living again and again the evil that hit her family. She described how she went to Sesi Grammatiko to recognize what was left of her child.
“I took my baby’s horsetail through the shrubs. I only found her head. A skull cut into two … This what I had buried … I have not found a body … If there are such beasts in society to scatter every girl … You will decide, but I blame them all, who designed months the kidnapping and helping each other … “, were her words … Immediately after that she collapsed at the witness step…
Until she was waiting for an ambulance to pick up her, she was crying and shouting her daughter’s name.
The mother of one of the accused who does not live anymore, had opened her heart to Angeliki Nikolouli in one of the shows that had as its main theme this extraordinary affair.
She told her that once her son went o her house with the main accuser of the case. She had a terrible impression on her that her child blindly obeyed him.
She send a touching message as mother-to-mother to Kaiti Kalathaki through “Tunnel”.
“My heart is near her … I hurt with her that I lost my child too … Tell her, my soul is near her… And I cry twice, I lost my own child also… God will punish me for what I say that I know… “, she said to Angeliki Nikolouli, while she was crying.
What says today the mother who dare to face the “beasts”…
Aggeliki Nikolouli, after twenty-one years, met again Kaiti Kalathaki, the mother of the unfortunate Soula.
Together they launched the incredible struggle to uncover the truth that lasted for eight years. The journalist’s research has moved the viewers who with their effective insistence helped to unravel the dark action of an unscrupulous gang.
“The case of my child made me a better person … If I hear someone is mourning because one of his relatives died, I run first to support him. When this story began, no one knew what would come to light and what we would be dealing with. But from the first day I knew something bad had happened to my child … ” she said.
They needed stellar nerves, infinite patience, obstacles that had to be overcome, and seventeen broadcasts amid serious threats to put a dot in this casel.
In the first court, the tragic mother lived for days over and over again at the loss of her child, seeing perpetrators in front of her.
” Do not forget Angeliki that I did not find my child’s whole body but her remains… She died so they could have rich lives and spend Nikolaidis money… Your struggle revealed all their dirt … “, she said excitedly to the reporter.
She remembered that all ordinary citizens even the interrogator, were telling her how unfortunate her daughter was and was found in the wrong place at the wrong time.
One of the most tragic moments for the mother was when one of the broadcast of Tunnel, the perpetrators who felt the knee tighten around them, did not hesitate to put an unknown woman to call the show and imitate her daughter who was still considered missing. Immediately Kaiti Kalathaki said that person who was heard was not her child.
Her bitterness is mellowing with her other two daughters and her five grandchildren.
“Angeliki you stood beside me as a rock and I will never forget it … You fought as if it were your own personal story, which became a subject of society … My own child will not come back … It does not change anything. But they have to be punished and not to take leave while serving their sentence … Personally I kneel in front of the gang leader and ask him to tell me where my child was buried… He told me that he did not know it my child … “, she said.
Asked by Angeliki Nikolouli if she had him in front of her what she would say, she replied:
“Nothing ! I refuse even to look at him … “.
She told the reporter that another of the respondents who had been acquitted called her on the phone and asked her permission to go to her daughter’s memorial and light a candle.
“I do not wish to any mother to pass through what I passed. I’m not unique … At that time we had not heard of other similar cases so strong. For me, this struggle became the purpose of my life, because my child was innocent … But I have to say to every mother who can be found in my place. Do not give up… Fight to find the truth. Get out ask for help, find a tip, “she concluded with emphasis.
“They killed two people for money”
“For us it is as if it did not pass one day. The pain is great and the wounds remain open. ”
With these words, the sister of a victim, Olga Nicolaidιs, described to Angeliki Nikolouli the great trauma she left to her and to her parents who are no longer living, the double killινγ that changed their lives forever.
“My parents left with a” why ” that torture them. When the trial began for six whole months the court had become our second home… We were going and we were coming with eight defendants to find the truth, who killed our man.. Finally, only two were convicted, the rest were released and they did not tell us who was the killer… “, she said.
Olga Nicolaidis stressed that the uninterrupted and methodical research of the show did not let this story be forgotten.
” I remember as it is now and it’s been twenty-one years that you found my brother’s car and my husband left me during the night to bring the key …” she said excitedly.
She stressed that her brother was literally sacrificed on the altar of money by unscrupulous villains.
“To kill two people for money, just to have a better life, to take away someone else’s life, is tragic … I did not feel like the pain that our parents experienced, I hope that no one lives something like that. . “, she said, excited …
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