The ex-wife of murdered UC Berkeley Professor Przemysław Jeziorski, her new companion and another two men were arrested in Athens, Greece on Wednesday in relation to the crime that took place in the northern suburb of Agia Paraskevi in early July.
The four men have reportedly confessed their involvement, while the ex-wife insists on her innocence. All five suspects will address their charges in court on Monday. The ex-wife is accused of incitement, her companion as the perpetrator, and the three other men as accessories to the murder.
UC Berkeley Professor murdered in broad daylight in Athens
Jeziorski was murdered by a masked gunman who had approached him and fired five shots at close range in his chest and neck, as he was on his way to pick up his children from his ex-wife’s residence on July 4. The killer then left the scene on foot, witnesses said, but vanished quickly from the area, which led authorities to believe that he had accessories.
The professor, who was a native of Poland, had traveled to Greece to attend a custody hearing regarding their teenage twins. Earlier that day, he had attended a meeting with his ex-wife and children at a children phycologist’s practice in Haidari.
Besides offspring, the former couple also shared a vacation home rentals management start-up which they appear to have co-founded in California in 2015.
Masked gunman flees murder scene on foot, takes bus to Athens city center
The Greek police have been intensively investigating the murder of UC Berkeley Professor Jeziorski with focus on audiovisual material and telecommunications.
Upon their arrest, all four men confessed their involvement in the crime. The ex-wife’s companion has allegedly admitted being the gunman who took the victim’s life, taking all the blame on himself.
The three other men, of whom one is a Bulgarian native and two Albanians, had been approached by the assailant to allegedly help him in a beating to “scare off” the victim. They helped him to buy the murder gun, which is yet to be found, in the black market in Athens, and then transported him by car to the crime scene.
While the Albanian accessories waited for him in a rented luxury car, the murderer fled the scene on foot and changed two buses to Athens city center, from where he took a taxi to the coastal town of Nafplio, south of Athens. He had left his mobile phone with his Bulgarian accessory there, in order to build an out-of-town alibi.
When the Albanians found out they had been involved in a murder case, they pressured the assailant for a larger sum to keep silent, which the ex-wife allegedly agreed to pay them but was arrested before giving the money.
