Fraud convictions didn’t prevent this lawyer from establishing a thriving practice in Cyprus

Christodoulides was sentenced in 2005 to nine years in prison, for “conspiracy to cheat and defraud, conspiracy to facilitate the commission of a breach of the immigration law and attempting to pervert the course of justice,” according to the findings of a Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

The judge took particular offense to the fact that he had committed the crimes while acting as a lawyer.

“A solicitor of the Supreme Court as you know is an officer of the Court and it is quite appalling that you should have behaved as you did over this considerable period of time,” said the judge.

Upon appeal, Christodoulides’ sentence was reduced to seven and a half years. He served three before walking out of Springhill prison in Buckinghamshire, a community northwest of London. 

Christodoulides had been granted a day pass on May 4, 2008, but did not return as required by 6:30 that evening. 

“A check of his room showed that he had taken his belongings,” says the warrant. “He never returned to HMP Springfield and thereafter left the jurisdiction and travelled to the Republic of Cyprus.”

Following his 2005 conviction, Christodoulides lost his license to practice law in the U.K. But that did not seem to bother the Cyprus authorities when he showed up and set up shop there.

“Incredibly, the Cyprus Bar admitted him as a solicitor because, of course, he had committed no offenses in Cyprus,” said Giovanni di Stefano, who has represented him in legal cases. 

“So he is in another country, and he continued to practice law until he did the same bloody thing again!”

‘Light Sentence’

In 2013, Christodoulides was convicted in Cyprus, an EU country, for selling fake German visas to clients trying to avoid deportation.

His clients “were in trouble with the law and were willing to pay any amount to secure documents that could legalize their stay in the European Union,” the verdict states.

Christodoulides was found guilty on eight charges, but received just 5 months in jail. The judge said his leniency was based on factors including a clean criminal record — even though Christodoulides had been convicted in the U.K.

The judge also took into account that Christodoulides was “a lawyer, intelligent, very well educated and had very good career prospects.” 

Following that 2013 conviction, his license to practice law was suspended for three years, but the Cyprus Bar Association agreed to allow him to work as a consultant for other legal offices.

Five years after the immigration fraud conviction, Christodoulides was brought to court in a human trafficking case involving Romanian women who were in “a dire financial situation” and were “lured” to Cyprus with the promise of work. Instead, their identity documents were taken away upon arrival, and they were locked up in apartments and threatened.

“While they came with dreams and goals for a better future for themselves and their families, they finally found themselves completely unexpectedly facing a nightmare of deception, exploitation, intimidation,” reads the 2018 verdict.

Christodoulides was initially convicted for “conspiracy,” with a judge finding that he had initiated the scheme. But the charge was dismissed upon appeal, because the main body of evidence against him came from another defendant in the case. 

In general, Cyprus has problems fighting human trafficking, according to Rita Theodorou Superman, an opposition parliamentarian who previously served as head of the anti-trafficking department with the national police.

“Those who believe, and have trust that institutions can go on the way they currently are, have no bearing with reality,” she said, without commenting specifically on the case involving Christodoulides.

“Maybe our judges don’t recognise the real problem,” she added. “Maybe they lack expertise. Maybe they fear for their lives because they’re dealing with organized crime.” 

Justice Postponed

In November 2022, a Cypriot court finally ordered Christodoulides to finish the remainder of his sentence for the U.K. immigration fraud case — a full 13 years after the European Arrest Warrant was issued, amid Britain’s failed attempts to extradite him.

When Christodoulides walked out of a British prison in 2008, he had four and a half years left on his sentence. But Cyprus authorities reduced that to 12 days.

Christodoulides was also facing a fine of 650,000 British pounds ($1 million) to be distributed to victims of the immigration fraud. He was supposed to spend an extra three years in prison if he didn’t pay up.

Rather than paying the fine to the U.K., Christodoulides served the sentence in Cyprus. He was initially handed three years for the unpaid fine, plus the 12 days for the remainder of his previous U.K. conviction. He was allowed to serve the sentence under house arrest, rather than going to prison. 

However, Christodoulides ended up serving only 15 months and one week. The parole board reduced his sentence based on factors including having “no previous convictions.”

Christodoulides’ parole also allowed him to “continue work as a freelance lawyer from his office in Nicosia.” The day after he was paroled, he appeared in a Facebook post announcing plans to expand his practice to the Cypriot cities of Limassol and Larnaca.