The Greek junta trials (Greek: Οι Δίκες της Χούντας translated as: The Τrials of the Junta) were the court trials involving members of the military junta that ruled Greece from 21 April 1967 to 23 July 1974. These trials involved the instigators of the 21 April coup d'état, as well as other junta members of various ranks who took part in the events of the Athens Polytechnic uprising and in the torture of citizens.
The military coup leaders were formally arrested during the metapolitefsi period that followed the junta, and in early August 1975 the government of Konstantinos Karamanlis brought charges of high treason and insurrection against Georgios Papadopoulos and other co-conspirators. The mass trial, described as "Greece's Nuremberg" and known as "The Trial of the Instigators", took place at the Korydallos Prison amidst heavy security.
The principal leaders of the 1967 coup, Georgios Papadopoulos, Stylianos Pattakos and Nikolaos Makarezos, were sentenced to death for high treason, following the trial. Shortly after the sentences were pronounced, they were commuted to life imprisonment by the Karamanlis government.
The trial of the instigators was followed by a second trial which investigated the events surrounding the Athens Polytechnic uprising known as "The Trial of the Polytechnic" and, finally, a series of trials involving incidents of torture known in Greece as "The Trials of the Torturers".
Journalist and author Leslie Finer, who was expelled by the junta from Greece in 1968, reporting in 1975 on the trials for New Society wrote: "The trial of 20 ringleaders of the 1967 coup is a test of democratic justice. Among its other functions, this is a mode of exorcism and education." The 1974 invasion of Cyprus was the final straw which led to the military withdrawing its support for the junta and for any military men acting as politicians.
Historical background
After the fall of the junta in July 1974, as the country entered the period of the Metapolitefsi, referring to the transition to democracy. Before the legislative elections in November of the same year, the transitional government headed by Konstantinos Karamanlis came under growing criticism from the opposition, including Georgios Mavros, the leader of the Centre Union - New Forces (the main opposition party at the time), against being too lenient to the members of the recently deposed military junta.
Mavros had demanded the arrest of the junta principals as a condition for cleaning up the political life of the country. He declared that as soon as the parliament was convened after the 1974 elections, he would propose legislation to annul any automatic immunity laws which the junta might have enacted to protect its members.
The press further demanded an investigation into the role of Brigadier Ioannidis during the crushing of the Polytechnic uprising, which the press called a "massacre". Ioannidis was the shadowy leader of the junta's final stage, who had been described as "the invisible dictator" in the press.
Karamanlis' government responded to these demands and ordered the junta principals Georgios Papadopoulos, Stylianos Pattakos, Nikolaos Makarezos, Ioannis Ladas and Michael Roufogalis arrested.
In addition, Georgios Papadopoulos, Dimitrios Ioannidis, Michael Roufogalis, Nikolaos Dertilis, Vassilios Bouklakos and Elias Tsiaouris (alternatively Tsapouris or Tsiaparas), who were also responsible of the Polytechnic events, were prohibited from leaving the country, as rumours were circulating that they were planning to escape abroad.
On 24 October 1974, Georgios Papadopoulos, Stylianos Pattakos, Nikolaos Makarezos, Ioannis Ladas and Michael Roufogalis were arrested and charged with conspiring again. Subsequently, they were sent to the island of Kea.
Ioannidis, was not arrested at that time, with the official explanation that he did not take part in the conspiracy of the Papadopoulos group. However the newspapers, such as To Vima, citied reliable sources, alleging that Ioannidis had disappeared and could not be found.
Immediately after the group of five was exiled to Kea, the opposition demanded to know the details of the actions of Papadopoulos and his co-conspirators prior to their arrest, while the government denied rumours of pro-junta manoeuvres among the military.
During his stay in Kea, Papadopoulos seemed confident that he and the members of his junta would be granted amnesty and they would eventually run for office and get elected. However, following a three-month stay on the island, in February 1975, Papadopoulos and the other four junta principals were transported by a torpedo boat to the port of Piraeus on their way to Korydallos prison. Ioannidis, having meanwhile been arrested on 14 January 1975, was already at the jail when Papadopoulos and his cohorts arrived.
The instigators
Trial of the instigators of the 21 April 1967 coup
On 28 July 1975, the trial of the instigators of the coup (Greek: Η Δίκη των Πρωταιτίων) commenced with Ioannis Deyannis as the presiding judge. Konstantinos Stamatis and Spyridon Kaninias were the prosecutors.
Deyannis had been appointed to the high court of Areios Pagos during the junta years. The mandate of the trial was to examine the events surrounding the 21 April 1967 coup, for which Papadopoulos and over twenty other co-defendants were charged with acts of high treason and mutiny. Security surrounding the trial was heavy: one thousand soldiers armed with submachine guns were guarding the jail's perimeter, and the roads leading to the jail were patrolled by tanks.
Despite these developments, Papadopoulos expressed his confidence to reporters that he would not remain incarcerated for long. He also assumed full responsibility for the April coup but refused to defend himself. Following Papadopoulos' lead, Stylianos Pattakos, Nikolaos Makarezos and other junta members announced that they also would not participate in the trial. Dimitrios Ioannidis announced that the trial was "unfortunately not interesting".
The defence announced that the reason their clients were not participating was that the Karamanlis government had prejudiced the outcome of the trial by declaring the 1967 coup a criminal offense. The lawyers of sixteen of the defendants walked out of the courtroom on the first day of the proceedings, declaring that they could not carry out their duties under a climate of terror and violence, to which the presiding judge Ioannis Deyannis replied: "Let all those who wish to leave—leave!".
Although there was an agreement among the defendants that they would keep silent during the trial and would not issue any statements, Papadopoulos broke his silence and declared to the court: "I am the leader of the Revolution, and I am responsible for everything". Pattakos, Makarezos and the rest of the junta members were surprised to hear Papadopoulos' statement because they believed they had an agreement that they would not politicize the trial based on their belief that they had nothing to gain. In their view, support among the people and in the army was now non-existent.
The charge of mutiny was contested because even though the colonels had in fact seized power illegally, they did so with the approval of their superior officer Lieutenant General Grigorios Spandidakis, who even joined the coup. Further, Karamanlis himself, by accepting the invitation of junta-appointed President Phaedon Gizikis to return to Greece, conferred a measure of legitimacy to the junta. It was also Gizikis who swore-in Karamanlis as prime minister.
During the trial, Spandidakis, Zoitakis and Stamatelopoulos differentiated their position from that of the other junta members. This divergence from the common defence line led Papadopoulos to strongly chastise one of his defence lawyers for trying to question one of Zoitakis' witnesses. He is reported as exclaiming: "He is not one of our witnesses. Do not ask him [any questions]".
Ioannidis declared to the court: "I accept my participation in the revolution of 21 April 1967. I have always been a soldier throughout my life, and I acted on my duty according to my conscience. I have nothing else to add." Deyannis, replied: "You are not accused of participating in revolution. You are accused of two crimes–do not be afraid of the term–high treason, this term is not very honourable to be attributed to you, and the second crime for which you are being accused is mutiny. Of these two crimes you are accused. Of revolution, you are not accused. What do you plead?" Ioannidis then replied: "I accept my participation in the revolution and any consequences arising from it."
Panagiotis Kanellopoulos, the last legitimate prime minister of Greece prior to the coup, acting as witness for the prosecution, testified how he was arrested by soldiers with machine-guns and transported to the palace to meet King Constantine. He added that during the meeting he urged the king to use his status as commander-in-chief of the Greek military to order loyal officers to rise up against the coup. He stated that Constantine refused to do so because he feared instigating bloodshed.
Kanellopoulos also stated at the trial that, against his advice, King Constantine swore-in the government of the colonels, an action which had helped legitimise their rule. Kanellopoulos' testimony had the effect of undermining the charge of mutiny. Kanellopoulos, during his testimony, also accepted his responsibility "before history" for not preempting the coup. He testified that there was no indication at all that the colonels were plotting "behind the backs" of the highest echelons of the army leadership.
Papadopoulos refused to testify and only declared: "I shall answer only to history and to the Greek people"; to which presiding judge Deyannis retorted: "Do you think history is absent from this courtroom?" Papadopoulos did not respond.
The question of the involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the coup, a widely held belief in Greece, was not addressed at the trial. Deyannis forbade all discussion on the subject with the remark that the trial was only confined to discovering the facts involved on the day the coup occurred. The only testimony about CIA involvement was given by Andreas Papandreou, who insisted that the colonels worked closely with the CIA.
Verdict
The trial of the instigators ended on 23 August 1975. Papadopoulos, Nikolaos Makarezos and Stylianos Pattakos were sentenced to death by firing squad, while Dimitrios Ioannidis received a life sentence. Seven others were sentenced to terms ranging from five to 20 years and two were acquitted. The crimes were deemed "momentary" and not "continuous" and considered to have lasted only between 20 and 21 April 1967. The verdict made it impossible to prosecute the collaborators of the junta.
This is the detailed table of the main sentences:
The death sentences were later commuted to life incarceration by the Karamanlis government.
On 28 August 1975 Konstantinos Karamanlis declared: "When we say life [sentence], we mean life [sentence]", meaning that the commutation of the sentences from death to life imprisonment would not be followed by further reductions.
Stamatelopoulos disagreed early after the coup with Papadopoulos and started publishing critical articles against the junta regime in the newspaper Vradyni. He was the only defendant for whom mitigating circumstances were considered, especially for having honestly regretted his participation in the coup. With his articles, he helped foster opposition to the regime.
The Polytechnic
Trial of the Polytechnic
On 16 October 1975, at 9 a.m., the second trial, investigating the events surrounding the Athens Polytechnic uprising (Greek: Η Δίκη του Πολυτεχνείου, translated as the "Trial of the Polytechnic") started in the same courtroom as the first trial, and lasted a total of fifty-seven days. There were thirty-three indicted including Papadopoulos, Ioannidis, M. Roufogalis, Vassilios Bouklakos, Elias Tsiaouris or Tsiaparas and Nikos Dertilis. Papadopoulos, Ioannidis, Roufogalis and Nikos Dertilis were already convicted and serving their sentences from the first trial.
The only defendant not present at the Polytechnic trial was Elias Tsiaouris (or Tsiaparas), accused of murder, who had escaped custody because he was in hiding. There were a total of 237 witnesses for the prosecution and the defence and about 50 lawyers.
The preliminary investigation for the events of the Polytechnic was carried out by prosecutor Dimitrios Tsevas, who submitted the results of his investigation to the office of the prosecutor general on 14 October 1974. In his report, Tsevas determined that Ioannidis and his deputy Roufogalis were on the scene during the events and directed their men with the purpose to create, through shootings and violence, conditions which would benefit Ioannidis' planned coup against Papadopoulos.
Ioannidis and Papadopoulos, even though they were sitting close to each other, never once exchanged a look. During the second trial, a documentary film was shown, shot by Dutch journalists, which showed the events surrounding the three-day occupation of the Polytechnic University, from the time the students entered the university to the crushing of the Polytechnic gates by the tanks. During the projection, Papadopoulos did not pay attention to the film, mostly looking down, while Ioannidis watched the film, reportedly unperturbed.
Antonis Agritelis, driver of Dertilis' jeep, testified that he saw Dertilis execute a youth on Patission Avenue. According to Agritelis' testimony, after the execution, Dertilis reentered the jeep and boasted about his marksmanship. Dertilis disputed Agritelis' testimony but the Court convicted him partly based on this testimony.