THE TWO Paralimni property developers at the centre of a police investigation involving an alleged assault on a British home buyer have been charged with bodily harm and malicious damage to personal property, police said yesterday.
Ayia Napa police chief George Economou said the father and son were charged “a few days ago”.
“They were charged with bodily harm and with causing malicious damage to his camera,” said Economou.
The Ayia Napa police chief could not say when the case would reach the courts. “That’s not up to us,” he said. “It’s up to the courts”.
Economou said it could take anything from a month to two months or longer.
The two men were arrested last month and remanded for four days by the Paralimni court for the alleged assault on British buyer Conor O’Dwyer, but then released without charge while police continued their investigations.
These culminated in the charges that have now been filed.
O’Dwyer, 38, spent a week in Larnaca hospital last month after he was beaten up in Frenaros when he went to take pictures of a house he had bought and over which he later came into dispute with the developers. He said they unilaterally cancelled his contract and kept his money, some £75,000 sterling, because he had pulled them up over what he saw as a violation of the terms of the contract. The case is pending at court.
O’Dwyer has widely publicised the details of his dispute with the developers on YouTube and on the website lyingbuilder.com.
In a public statement recently, the developers accused O’Dwyer of allegedly masterminding a plan to extort a newer, more expensive property, and exorbitant damages from the company.
But the company had “failed to adhere to his blackmail requests”.
O’Dwyer says he attempted several times to make the payment because he decided to keep the house despite the differences between the original plan and the reality, but the developers refused to take the due payment, deciding, O’ Dwyer said, that he was giving them too much hassle over the terms of the contract.
They in turn accused him of violating the terms of the contract and said in a letter posted on O’Dwyer’s website that they would be keeping all money paid so far for damages.
Copyright © Cyprus Mail 2008