Marfin case: 46-year-old woman granted time to testify – “She maintains her innocence,” says her lawyer

The 46-year-old woman, who is alleged to have been involved in the 2010 arson attack on the Marfin bank branch, was granted until Tuesday (11/8) to testify.

She was taken under extremely tight security and wearing a bulletproof vest before the 3rd investigating magistrate. Earlier, she had been brought before the Athens Court of Appeal Prosecutor’s Office for the international arrest warrant issued against her to be executed.

She faces charges alleging that she played a supporting role in the deaths of the three bank employees who became trapped inside the burning building following the arson attack.

The two main defendants in the tragedy, both 42-year-old men, are being held in pre-trial detention following their testimony before the 3rd investigating magistrate. They were arrested on charges of multiple counts of intentional homicide.

A number of supporters gathered outside the investigating magistrates’ offices in solidarity with the defendant and shouted slogans in her support.

The process for her extradition to Greece was completed late on Thursday night, when a team from the Greek FBI took custody of her on British soil.

The defendant was subsequently returned to the Attica General Police Directorate, where she will remain in custody until she gives her testimony.

What her lawyer said

Her lawyer, Kostas Papadakis, stressed that the 46-year-old “has maintained her innocence from the very beginning” and said that, based on the case-file evidence currently available to him, there has been no identification linking her to the offence.

“As is known, the defendant, after 25 days of detention in London — unjustified detention, despite the fact that she had consented from the very beginning and had even sought to come to Greece at her own expense — is being held at the General Police Directorate and today appeared before the competent investigating magistrate in order to request time to prepare her testimony. She will testify on Tuesday morning,” Mr Papadakis initially said.

“As far as the substance of the case is concerned, I do not have much to say, because I am waiting to receive the case file so that I can study and assess it and prepare the defence strategy. I will repeat that she is innocent, that she has maintained this from the very beginning, that she has absolutely no connection with the acts attributed to her and that, based on what I currently know from the case file, the claim that there has been an identification of a person is false. It does not correspond to reality as far as the defendant I represent is concerned. We will say more on Tuesday,” he stressed.

Kostas Papadakis also underlined that his 46-year-old client had taken part in the 2010 demonstration “like the 100,000 people who were there at the time”, but was not at the location where the bank was set on fire.

She is alleged to have played a supporting role

According to the police investigation, the 46-year-old woman is alleged to have played an assisting role in the group of people who carried out the attack on Marfin.

She was arrested on July 13 at London’s Gatwick Airport, shortly before boarding a flight bound for Athens, as an Interpol Red Notice had already been issued against her.

According to reports, when she was informed that she had been included in the case file, she contacted officers from the Homicide Department, maintaining that she was innocent and that she wished to provide explanations before the Greek justice system.

According to the police assessment, her presence at the scene was of a supporting nature, and she was standing a short distance from the man who is alleged to have smashed the window of the bank branch.

The two main defendants

The two main defendants in the case are two 42-year-old men who are already being held at Malandrino and Nafplio prisons.

According to the case file, one of them is alleged to have coordinated the group and given the instructions for the attack, while the second is accused of carrying out the act of smashing the bank’s window so that Molotov cocktails could be thrown inside, causing the deadly fire.

Authorities believe that the second man is the 42-year-old known by the nickname “Tall”, who, according to eyewitnesses, was wearing a black shirt and a beige cap during the attack.

The case was reopened following a fresh assessment of the evidence, while footage from security cameras played a decisive role in the investigation, having captured the attack on the Marfin branch frame by frame, as well as the dramatic moments that followed, with employees attempting to escape from the burning building.