Novartis ‘OPEKEPE of medicine,’ former protected witness tells hearing

Philistor Destempasides, a erstwhile protected witness successful Greece’s high-profile Novartis bribery case, described the pharmaceutical radical arsenic the “OPEKEPE of medicine” during testimony connected Tuesday, invoking the scandal-hit farming payments bureau to underscore what helium called systemic corruption.

Destempasides, antecedently known under the pseudonym “Maximos Sarafis,” is connected trial alongside different erstwhile protected witness, Maria Maraggeli, who was code-named “Aikaterini Kelesi.” They look charges of perjury and mendacious accusations, prompted aft transgression complaints filed by elder governmental figures they had implicated with statements, including erstwhile premier curate Antonis Samaras, Bank of Greece politician Yannis Stournaras, and Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis.

“When the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office called me, I – knowing that the institution was corrupt from the wrong – saw nary crushed not to comply,” Destempasides said. “Novartis was a centrally corrupt company. It’s the OPEKEPE of pharmaceuticals.” Asked whether helium testified successful the United States, helium invoked his close to stay silent.

He stressed that his cognition of alleged bribery came from erstwhile Novartis enforcement Konstantinos Frouzis. “There was planning, there was a slush fund, there was a idiosyncratic coordinating these things, and that was Frouzis,” helium said, adding: “I ne'er claimed I witnessed a bribe. Everything I mentioned was communicative successful nature.”

Destempasides said his relation successful media and situation absorption gave him wide penetration crossed departments. “I had to cognize things successful bid to bash what we telephone situation management,” helium noted, describing nonstop oregon indirect practice with each units.

He argued Greece was cardinal to Novartis’ operations: “Greece was the diamond of Novartis,” helium said, calling the state a top marketplace comparative to colonisation and adding that “pharmaceutical companies are not churches; they are [vehicles of] corruption.” He emphasized, however, that the ungraded was not constricted to doctors.

Both Destempasides and Maraggeli, who worked arsenic Frouzis’ secretary, mislaid their protected witness status successful October 2024. Their trial began successful April amid a bid of ineligible objections.