A TEEN’S first holiday abroad with pals and no parents should be a time for fun and making great memories.
But for Brit Olivia, it became a living hell after she was raped on the last day of a getaway to Greece — then forced to endure YEARS of ongoing torment in her fight for justice.
Brit Olivia was raped on holiday in Greece and then forced to endure years of torment in her battle for justice
GettyOlivia, then aged 18, travelled to Rethymno in Crete with friends three years ago[/caption]
She was restrained before being dragged away by her attackersAlamy
After bravely facing her attackers in court to give a harrowing account of the July 2022 sex assault, two men were convicted and sentenced to life behind bars.
But Olivia was later dealt a bitter blow when the pair exercised their right under Greek law to not just an appeal, but a full retrial.
She also faced suggestions she may have made a false allegation in order to claim “rape insurance”.
Today, Olivia and her mum Hannah will make their THIRD trip to Greece, where the victim will have to enter the witness box again to recount events of that devastating night as her attackers bid to clear their names.
If she chose not to attend proceedings, it might go in favour of the accused and they could walk free.
It is the latest twist in a devastating ordeal which began when Olivia, then aged 18, travelled to Rethymno in Crete with friends three years ago to celebrate the end of her A-levels.
‘Emotional toll’
As she relaxed on a sunbed, happy and tired after a fun night out, she was approached by two men who she had never seen before.
They restrained her before dragging her down the beach, where they took turns raping her whilst the other held her down. Olivia sustained serious physical harm and was deeply traumatised by the attack.
“I feared for my life,” she says. “They claimed in court I consented and then stopped when they realised I was resisting, which is a lie.”
Olivia reported the savage assault to police immediately, and her assailants — both Pakistani men in their twenties — were caught within hours.
But her ordeal was far from over. She faced the anguish of tests for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, and was also swabbed for the rapists’ DNA.
There was then a year-long wait for the case to come to court.
Olivia and Hannah attended the proceedings at their own expense, though they could ill-afford it.
The traumatised victim had to face her attackers in a waiting area and deliver her testimony while they sat nearby.
“There were the two rapists sitting there, metres from me, staring,” Olivia tells me.
“I couldn’t believe there was no separate area in the court, especially for a rape case”.
Hannah adds: “My daughter endured hours of cross-examination from multiple male lawyers while a team of supporters sat behind them, amplifying the intimidation she faced.”
During the trial, Olivia had to repeat her statement because the court-hired translator was not doing the job adequately.
And the accused, who had spoken fluent English on the night of the rape, claimed they could not understand, creating further hold-ups.
GettyOlivia and her mum are having to make their third trip to Greece as her attackers bid to clear their names[/caption]
“It was deeply heartbreaking to witness my daughter having to recount her experience twice, with prolonged breaks in the proceedings,” says Hannah.
The trial, which should have lasted one day, instead took four.
And the women had to return home before the verdict as they could not afford the cost of staying in Greece for any longer.
When proceedings finally ended in June 2023, Olivia hoped that the men being sent down for life — the maximum penalty available — marked the end of the distressing chapter.
“I thought it was all over and done with,” she says, “and that we could all get on with our lives”.
But what Olivia and Hannah didn’t know was that under Greek law, a convicted criminal has an automatic right to a complete retrial.
This means the whole case will be heard afresh in court.
So in March this year, mother and daughter travelled to Crete yet again for a second trial, only to learn proceedings would be delayed because one of the perpetrators’ lawyers had told the court he had Covid.
“I couldn’t believe it,” says Olivia, “because not only had I prepared myself for another traumatic experience, we had gone into debt because of all the travel and missing work”.
These lines of questioning and character attacks seem completely irrelevant to the facts of the case at hand
Alexis Anagnostakis
Of her return to Greece today to attend rescheduled proceedings, Olivia adds: “This has been a nightmare for me and my family. I am the victim of serious crimes.”
Alexis Anagnostakis is the Athens-based lawyer representing Olivia. He tells me that these delays have placed an extraordinary “emotional toll” on the victim, “only for hearings to be delayed or cancelled”.
What he has found particularly troubling is the unwarranted scrutiny of Olivia’s private life from the defence. It’s claimed one of their tactics was to suggest that Olivia had taken out “rape insurance”.
Hannah explains: “The myth is that women from northern Europe go on holiday and get ‘raped’ on their last day, and then claim insurance.”
The suggestion is that the allegations is false, made to cash in.
Recalling another time when victims’ actions were called into question, Hannah says: “A Greek diplomat was sacked [in 2011] over horrendous comments about Swedish women.
Heartless and shambolic
“He said they should be ashamed of their behaviour, and it was circulating in the Greek press. And this seems to have carried on.”
Alexis Anagnostakis adds: “These lines of questioning and character attacks seem completely irrelevant to the facts of the case at hand”.
He describes it as a classic case of “victim-blaming”.
Hannah also tells me that the first question asked by a Greek lawyer when she initially sought legal representation in Crete was, “Does she have rape insurance?”.
Olivia says the assumption that “young women will ‘cry rape’ in order to then claim the insurance and make a profit is terrible”.
In addition to the emotional trauma the family has endured, the financial cost of securing justice has been well beyond their means, causing additional stress.
Alexis Anagnostakis has been alarmed by what he describes as the “protracted delays and repeated postponements”, branding them more than just minor admin hiccups.
He tells me: “The critical impact of this is the extraordinary burden it places on the victim.”
Hannah has painstakingly sought to shed light on those aspects of the process that she considers “deeply flawed”.
She feels that such cases must be taken seriously and victims treated with respect, rather than “as pawns in legal manoeuvrings”.
Olivia says that, despite the pain and terror she experience throughout her ordeal, she had a positive experience with police, whose handling of the case she called “very good”.
I refuse to think about never going to Greece again. I won’t let them spoil that for me.
Olivia
“I’m really grateful for the way that they dealt with it, because it was obviously extremely traumatic . . . it was all very uncomfortable, but they got all the DNA and medical stuff out of the way within a few hours.
“They were very accommodating and concerned about my feelings,” she reveals.
Olivia is also keen to stress that many people, including locals and staff at the British Embassy, were extremely kind to her, which gave her renewed strength.
‘Justice not punishment’
“So it’s not the whole country, it’s the system,” she says.
“I wasn’t traumatised coming back to Greece. Obviously, I’m still scared, but there are lovely things about the country.
“I refuse to think about never going to Greece again. I won’t let them spoil that for me.”
If this system continues in the heartless and shambolic way that Olivia’s case has highlighted, other young female tourists from Britain and beyond may choose to stay away.
And for Hannah, the dangerous “rape insurance” myth needs to be challenged once and for all.
“My daughter deserves justice, not punishment,” she insists.
Names have been changed to protect the victim.