Police taking measures to protect state pathologist

Police confirmed on Thursday that they had already taken some security measures for the protection of Panicos Stavrianos, the medical examiner that wrote up the initial report on the death of national guardsmen Thanasis Nicolaou in 2005.

Stavrianos was the state pathologist who ruled the death a suicide in 2005 after Nicolaou was found under a bridge in Alassa.

However, the latest independent report into his death found evidence of criminality, plus omissions and mistakes. The report was handed to the attorney-general earlier this month.

In a statement, police spokesman Christos Andreou said: “Some measures are being taken since yesterday.”

On Wednesday, Andreou said the police would be examining Stavrianos’ request for protection.

Following the latest revelations, Stavrianos had written a letter through his lawyers to the AG, the justice minister and the chief of police expressing concern over ‘trial by media’ and by the two investigators, in relation to his conclusions in the case.

One of the investigators, Savvas Matsas said on Sunday during a memorial for Nicolaou that there had been “so many mistakes, so many omissions, so many distortions of the real facts”, so serious that he had never come across them throughout his whole career.