ATHENS – While investigations are ongoing into claims by a number of people, mostly women, of alleged sexual harassment and even rape, a Greek actor whose name has surfaced is taking legal steps to stop it.

Petros Filippidis, who’s appeared on TV series, was dropped from a comedy on the state-run ERT station earlier when his name came up as he vehemently denied any wrongdoing.

He accused a lawyer of slander for mentioning the actor’s name in a harassment complaint made by one of his clients to the Association of Greek Actors, a number of whom said they faced regular harassment.

“It seems that you do not understand the basics, that these allegations are not mine, but those of my client, as I made absolutely clear from the beginning during my public statement,” the lawyer responded, said Kathimerini.

After he was released from the TV series as the #MeToo movement grew in Greece, he released a statement through his lawyer maintaining his innocence and dismissing the allegations.

“I am noticing with regret that ad-hoc TV courts have been set up in the last 24 hours. I refuse to be ‘butchered’ on TV ‘windows’, where each speaker will express an opinion without being able to corroborate any evidence to a competent authority, resulting in the tarnishing of my name and my personality,” he said.

He suggested he and others were being unfairly targeted with innuendo and without proof and said that he would let any investigations play out, upset that cases were being built” through TV shows, social media sites.”

The movement of alleged harassment in the sports, media, and arts began when Olympic gold medalist Sofia Bekatorou said she was raped two decades earlier by an official of the Hellenic Sailing Federation.

With the former head of the Greek National Theater jailed on charges of committing two rapes – which he denied – the actors association  said it will give a prosecutor more reports of sexual misconduct in the community.

That could see the investigations expanding deeper into the sector as Dimitris Lignadis, 56, remains in detention in a case in which prosecutors said he raped 14-year-old boy in 2010 and assaulted another minor, which he denied.