A British father who lost his young son in a fall from a Paphos hotel appeared in court on Thursday, a day after what would have been the child’s third birthday, having just learnt that his request to suspend any prosecution has been denied.

The family now faces the possibility of a criminal trial after the attorney-general rejected the defence’s move to suspend the father’s prosecution, his lawyer Alexandros Alexandrou said after the hearing at Paphos district court.

Alexandrou said the defence had submitted its request on August 7, setting out a series of arguments, including humanitarian considerations and the ordeal the family has endured since the child’s death. The father’s parents were with him in court.

Central to the request, he said, was the need for the family to be together, to grieve and support one another.

The attorney-general’s response was received on Wednesday afternoon, the day the little boy would have turned three. According to Alexandrou, the response was limited to three lines.

In court on Thursday, a representative of the attorney-general acknowledged the tragedy experienced by the family but said the Legal Service considered that the case should proceed in the public interest.

AG says case should proceed

Alexandrou expressed disappointment at the decision.

The father had returned to Cyprus earlier this week with his parents after being permitted to travel to the UK for his son’s funeral. His travel documents have again been surrendered. 

The lawyer said he would now sit down with his client and go through the options before a decision is made on how he will answer the charge.

“I have to sit down with him, explain the procedure, explain where we stand today, what the pros and cons are, give him my advice and my approach,” Alexandrou said.

He added that the father would have to understand what a contested trial would entail, including the evidence that would be heard and the possibility that he himself may have to testify.

Father returns to Cyprus

For Alexandrou, that consideration cannot be separated from what the family has already been through.

“We must not forget that he too is a victim of his own, in quotation marks, carelessness,” he said.

The prospect of a trial, he added, could mean having to relive the circumstances of his son’s death through testimony and evidence in court.

Asked by the Cyprus Mail whether the recent case of another child who fell from the sixth floor of a building could have had any bearing on the attorney-general’s decision, Alexandrou said the two cases must be considered separately.

“Each case has to be looked at separately,” he said.

Other child fall case dismissed as comparison

While they may have a similar legal background, Alexandrou said the circumstances surrounding the alleged offences were “very different”.

“I don’t want to believe that any perception was influenced because another incident happened, because that would be a very superficial approach,” he said.

“Otherwise justice would be a robot. You would put some data in and we would need neither judges, nor the evaluation of testimony, nor anything else.”

He said he therefore did not believe the other incident had influenced the attorney-general’s decision, adding that his client’s case should be viewed “very differently”.

The case will return to Paphos district court on September 22 at 9am, when the father is due to enter a plea.

Until then, Alexandrou said he would discuss the case and its possible consequences with his client before advising him on how to plead.

The British father is charged with causing death by a rash or negligent act following the death of his son, who fell from a fourth-floor window at a hotel in Chlorakas on July 12, shortly after the family arrived in Cyprus for a holiday.