PAPHOS, Cyprus (AP) — Details were presented on Tuesday in the trial of a British man who pleaded guilty to a charge of negligence regarding the fatal fall of his 3-year-old son from a hotel window in Cyprus.
According to evidence heard in court, the 38-year-old defendant, his son and father-in-law were making their way to the elevator from their fourth-floor room at the King Evelthon hotel in Paphos on July 12.
The father lifted the child to look out
a window at the hotel's waterpark when the boy slipped and tumbled 12 meters (about 40 feet), falling to his death.
His lawyer, Alexandros Alexandrou, said the defendant didn’t recall the circumstances of the fall because it happened so quickly. But he and his father-in-law had told investigators that they thought the glass window pane was shut.
Cypriot law prohibits a defendant from being named before this occurs in court proceedings, unless the defendant does so voluntarily. His lawyer told the court that he works as an auditor at a major U.K. firm.
Prosecutor Chryso Perganti said that the boy was pronounced dead in hospital a couple of hours after his fall, having suffered multiple skull and bone fractures and damage to his vital organs. He also said a blood sample taken from the defendant roughly six hours after the boy’s fall showed that he had consumed alcohol but was under the legal limit.
The defendant, sitting in the dock, was visibly distraught and constantly wiped tears from his eyes as he heard the translator recount the details. His parents were also sitting in the rear of the courtroom, his mother’s eyes red from weeping.
Alexandrou pleaded for leniency for his client, and the judge said she would rule on Oct. 16.
Cyprus, a former British colony, is very popular with tourists from the U.K., who make up a significant portion of the roughly 4 million holidaymakers the island nation received in recent years.
