New lawsuit filed at Supreme Court over deadly 2018 Mati fire
A woman who lost her husband and two children in the July 2018 fire in the east Attica coastal town of Mati filed a new lawsuit with the Supreme Court prosecutor’s office on Tuesday.
Varvara Voukaki is suing the head of the Greek Fire Service and its officer in charge of airborne firefighting, the officer of the Greek Police responsible for aerial support, a deputy regional governor for East Attica and the former general inspector for public administration. She claims that her husband and children died as a result of oversights committed by these officials.
He lawsuit comes after they allegedly declined her request for official documents detailing their response to the disaster.
“They attempted, by their refusal, to prevent the quest for the real truth, to cover up their criminal culpability,” the lawsuit filed by Voukaki’s lawyer, Vassilis Kapernaros, claims.
Following privately conducted investigations, Voukaki claims that the fire service and the police failed to mobilize all of their aerial forces to direct the evacuation of Mati and battle the flames and that had they done so, her family – and others – may have survived.
Her lawsuit also contains excerpts from witness testimonies taken during the preliminary inquiry into the tragedy, which cost more than 100 lives, to back her claims of inefficiency and confusion in the state’s response to the fire.
