Mom of useless soldier has been known as loopy and a liar for insisting her son was murdered. After 19 years, a courtroom has lastly agreed, however the struggle is just not but over
Thanasis Nicolaou’s mom has fought most cancers twice. However her largest battle is uncovering the reality behind her son’s homicide.
Andriana Nicolaou could also be small in stature, however her energy and willpower are all-consuming. It’s laborious to imagine that this highly effective lady who has turn into proficient in all issues authorized, forensic and pathological is 75 years outdated.
Her dwelling, perched on a hill in Limassol overlooks the military unit the place her son served his nationwide guard obligation.
It was on that web site he endured horrific bullying and witnessed what seemingly led to his killing: drug use on the camp web site.
His “mistake” was that as a substitute of getting concerned, he selected to report it. A day after he spoke out, he was discovered useless below Alassa bridge.
That was again on September 29, 2005, when Thanasis was aged 26. He could be 45 this yr however he was killed three months into his military service.
Andriana spoke to the Cyprus Mail, afew days after the cupboard appointed two unbiased investigators to look into the case, and just some weeks after a 3rd dying inquiry dominated that he was certainly murdered.
She smiles on the symbolism that the lawyer shares the identical first title as her son – Thanasis Athanasiou. He will probably be collaborating with retired Greek police lieutenant Lambros Pappas.
For 19 years the authorities have insisted Thanasis killed himself. They advised Andriana “it occurs” and he or she ought to “simply settle for it.”
She was incessant, and nonetheless is. “How may he have jumped off 30 metres from the bridge and his physique be unscathed?”
By unscathed, she means he didn’t have any seen perforations which might be anticipated from such a robust drop onto the pebbly terrain below the bridge.
Andriana remembers how when she returned from the morgue, there have been three automobiles with military officers ready to speak to her.
“I believed they needed to assist me. However I realised by means of their questions that they needed to search out out what I knew. What Thanasis had advised me.”
The most recent legal investigation carried out by Savvas Matsas and Antonis Alexopoulos paint a really completely different image from the one drawn up by the state pathologist Panicos Stavrianos, who known as it a suicide.
Matsas has gone public to say he believes there have been three folks concerned within the killing. One who held Thanasis’ fingers behind his again, one other who beat him and one other who finally strangled him.
His household suspect he was pressured to knock again the beer within the empty cans present in his automotive. Matsas’ report suggests the one that threw the punches might have been sporting boxing gloves. Thanasis suffered intensive inner accidents.
The sand which crammed his mouth level to the thought the violence unfolded by the seaside and his physique later moved to Alassa.
“They advised me the artery on his leg had been minimize,” Andriana says as she flits by means of the post-mortem photos. The pictures themselves have been incriminating for the findings, as Thanasis’ proper leg is hidden beneath his left one within the image.
As such, the harm stays hidden from sight within the official photos. Andriana’s suspicions have been raised, nonetheless, when she picked up his garments from the morgue and noticed her son’s sock was drenched in blood.
“It was these photos that saved me combating all these years.”
Andriana seems out of the window the place the military barracks linger within the background. “My son went to serve his nation. They are saying they’ll practice them towards the enemy – Turkey. However the actual enemy was inside.”
With a complete of 4 youngsters, Thanasis was her second little one. However she says he didn’t take after her or her husband’s manner.
“He had one thing particular about him. Like he was despatched by an angel.”
Thanasis’ father Charalambos is the polar reverse of Andriana. He’s far quieter and flits out and in of the interview. Aged 81, his voice is usually shaky, and in stark comparability to his spouse’s highly effective tone, he sounds horrifyingly perplexed when recalling the injustices.
However neither of them can ever escape the shadow of all the things that has occurred. Each household celebration, together with even considered one of one other son’s marriage ceremony and the arrival of her first grandson “have been enveloped by this cloud”.
“This has destroyed the entire household,” Andriana says as her voice breaks.
“Thanasis dreamed of getting married and having youngsters. However they killed him.”
She talks about her son’s architectural drawings and beams with pleasure. “His work was impeccable. He was so good at what he did. The primary time he received paid for his work, he was so excited. He couldn’t wait till he completed the military to open his personal architect’s workplace.
“After which they killed him.”
Her eldest son who got here together with her to the crime scene had already served his time within the military. Her youngest son was exempt after Thanasis’ dying. Her daughter is the youngest within the household, and all have paid a excessive value of their struggling.
The plan Andriana envisioned for her Limassol dwelling was starkly completely different. It was supposed to accommodate her 4 youngsters and their households. After years of laborious work in Australia, they thought they’d settle again in Cyprus, and they also returned to the island in 2003.
Two years later, Thanasis was discovered useless.
“Once I noticed his physique, my life stopped.”
Since then, it has been an infinite struggle. In opposition to the authorized service, towards the police, towards the military, towards the courts.
The injustices which have been dealt this household are grotesque. They’ve seen folks implicated within the poor dealing with of Thanasis’ case rise by means of the ranks. They’ve been known as loopy, gaslit and mocked for his or her religion.
They’ve seen state pathologist Panicos Stavrianos turn into elected as Akel MP solely months after ruling that Thanasis dedicated suicide.
They noticed Stavrianos sit on the Home human rights committee of all locations. They watched him get re-elected and serve a complete of 10 years as a lawmaker.
They then watched him search a 3rd time period in parliament, this time on the Inexperienced get together ticket. And that was a yr after the European Courtroom of Human Rights (ECHR) determination discovered Cyprus’ investigation into Thanasis’ dying insufficient.
The ECHR’s ruling performed a monumental function. It left district courts with no different selection however to simply accept the household’s request to have Thanasis’ stays exhumed.
And as such, in 2020, they noticed their son’s stays dug up from the bottom, as they nonetheless begged for solutions over his dying.
Andriana has chased after each authorities official doable, ran after each media outlet (lengthy earlier than it grew to become widespread to speak to her and he or she was determined for somebody to listen to her story).
She has not had it straightforward. Past the horrors she confronted, understanding that her son fell sufferer to a violent dying, she was shunned, ignored and labeled as loopy for refusing to simply accept that Thanasis had dedicated suicide.
She has additionally battled towards most cancers twice previously 19 years.
It’s inconceivable to know how lengthy these years have felt, however the stacks of paper piled up on the lounge desk inform the story.
“This isn’t it. Come, let me present you.”
She leads me to her bed room the place two bookcases are bursting with field information relationship again to 2005, rows upon rows of them stacked subsequent to one another, documenting each single letter, report and discovering of the investigations surrounding her son’s homicide.
Earlier than I may even start to course of simply how a lot there may be, she factors to extra folders. These ones are stacked with papers much more private. Her poetry.
“I wrote these and wept. I cried and cried and cried. All these years, I misplaced my son.”
Her poems have been a part of her grieving course of, the place she prayed for solutions and tried to return to phrases with Thanasis’ homicide.
Her eyes, sharp, don’t miss a beat. Within the 19 years which have elapsed since her son’s dying, she has familiarised herself with legislation, forensics, pathology, criminology, media and each different specialty she needed to grasp to struggle for justice.
“I save each single article that has been written about my son. I obtain them although, as a result of typically they delete them,” she tells me with a pointed look.
Her telephone rings incessantly. Name after name, she by no means will get a break. “They killed my son,” she repeats so usually, when folks probe.
After one name with a journalist, she remarks moderately sadly, that none of those folks have been right here for her so a few years in the past when her struggle was much more lonely.
“They known as me loopy,” she says. “However I knew my son.”
Detached to the gaslighting she was put by means of by so many, she ploughed on incessantly.
Some advised her she was brainwashed by faith, one other prime authorities official urged her to forgive the culprits. A cynic might imagine they have been making an attempt to dissuade her from pushing the way in which she did. However she was relentless.
“Deliver me the murderers in entrance of me after which we are able to discuss forgiveness.”
She remembers dates, wordings and letters off the highest of her head. Throughout courtroom proceedings, she may simply be mistaken as one of many attorneys. Her field file on the prepared, usually occasions understanding the place to search out every doc that was being mentioned.
She would scroll by means of her telephone throughout breaks to see what information retailers had written concerning the case thus far.
The girl has not paused for 19 years.
“Have you ever ever processed the enormity of how a lot your life has modified? That that is your every day life?” I ask.
“If I do this, I’ll go loopy,” she says. “It’s higher for me if I preserve going. Till the day I die, I gained’t cease.” Her struggle has actually been infinite, however does she hope for mild on the finish of the tunnel after the coverup for nearly 20 years?
“Even now, the sunshine has shone within the darkness,” Andriana says over the third dying inquiry of her son’s dying on Might 10. She remembers how some doubted the choose Doria Varoshiotou, seeing a girl in her 30s sitting within the prime publish of the courtroom room.
“And but, she was the one that allow the reality shine. She took me out of the hell I endured for 19 lengthy years, as I attempted to revive my son’s title.”
It is because it was the primary time a courtroom in Cyprus known as her son’s dying a killing, attributing it to strangulation.
Andriana shrugs off most of the epithets she is most frequently related to comparable to ‘courageous’ and ‘robust’. She cares little for these phrases and repeats: “I did my obligation as a mom.”
On the time, she says she had two paths: despair or struggle. However she was so certain over what occurred to her son that she couldn’t be silenced.
“I see him typically in my goals. He guides me.”