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![[370691] ΑΠΟΦΑΣΗ ΤΟΥ ΕΦΕΤΕΙΟΥ ΓΙΑ ΤΗΝ ΔΟΛΟΦΟΝΙΑ ΤΟΥ ΖΑΚ ΚΩΣΤΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ (ΤΑΤΙΑΝΑ ΜΠΟΛΑΡΗ/EUROKINISSI)](https://www.thenationalherald.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/6270148-1568x1044.jpg "People gathered Mixed Jury Court of Appeal on the beating to death of Zak Kostopoulos, Wednesday July 10, 2024. (TATIANA BOLARI/EUROKINISSI)")
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ATHENS – A jewelry store owner and real estate agent were sentenced for the 2018 beating death of Greek-American gay rights activist Zak Kostopoulos, the Mixed Jury Court of Appeal of Athens upholding a 2022 verdict.
Two years ago the court gave the 80-year-old jewelry store, inside whose property Kostopoulos was beaten, house arrest after he and the real estate agent – neither named despite being convicted – house arrest instead of going to jail.
The appeals court gave the jewelry store owner a 5-year sentence and the real estate agent to six year, the court finding that while Kostopoulos displayed “inappropriate behavior” toward the jeweler that it didn’t offset the beating.
A prosecutor said the jeweler trapped Kostopoulos inside the store and assaulted him excessively and challenged the real estate agent’s defense of intervening out of altruism, citing inconsistencies in his story.
Seeking leniency, the defendants said they hadn’t broken the law previously, said that Kostopoulos agitated the incident and that they displayed good behavior after beating him to death.
Kostopoulos died after an altercation in the jewelry shop in downtown Athens. The two business owners claimed they had tried to detain him after he tried to rob the store and before police arrived.
Kostopoulos died of multiple injuries after his detention by police, which was also criticized by the prosecutor at the time for using undue force to detain him.
In the 2022 trial, the prosecutor said the defendants “have shown no regrets – on the contrary, they appear not to have comprehended the criminality of their deed.” Kostopoulos, he said, “never attacked the defendants, since he was trapped and they were safe. It was proven they attacked him. Their actions and behavior show that no mitigating circumstance must be allowed for either.”
The prosecutor said the two men knew the repeated blows to the head of the victim could be fatal, adding that the incident looked like “a lynching,” in calling for them to be sent to jail in a case that dragged on for years.
