Pictured: The Georgian robber suspected of murdering British mother beside her baby in Greece
- Caroline Crouch, 20, was strangled to death by burglar in Athens suburb home
- A Georgian man was arrested last week trying to flee Greece on fake passport
- He matches a description given by Ms Crouch’s husband Babis from the attack
- Expected Babis will come face-to-face with alleged killer in police line-up today
- The man, 43, was previously arrested for burglary on a home 20 minutes from where Ms Crouch lived
THIS is the first picture of the man police have arrested over the murder of a British mother in Athens.
The 43-year-old Georgian national was stopped on the Greek border with Bulgaria on Friday and immediately linked to Caroline Crouch’s brutal death.
Miss Crouch was tortured and killed in front of her 11-month-old daughter Lydia while her husband, helicopter pilot Charalambos Anagnostopoulos, 33, lay bound and gagged at their home in an affluent suburb in the Greek capital.
Mr Anagnostopoulos came face to face with the suspect at a police station yesterday to try to determine whether he was one of the three men who broke into his home.
It is not known if he was able to identify the Georgian, but the suspect fits the description of the ringleader of the gang the pilot saw during the raid through a gap in his blindfold.
Wearing a black tracksuit with a hoodie wrapped around his face and his hands cuffed behind his back, the suspect was later marched into a courthouse by two police officers for a short hearing closed to the public.
He has been charged with carrying out a violent burglary in March that bears striking similarities to the horrifying break-in at Miss Crouch’s home in Glyka Nera last Tuesday.
A Georgian man suspected of savagely killing a British mother Caroline Crouch, 20, during a burglary at her home in Greece has been seen attending court to answer charges relating to another burglary 20 minutes from where Ms Crouch lived
Briton Caroline Crouch (left) was strangled to death in front of her daughter during a horror break-in which husband Babis Anagnostopoulos (right) survived
Photos taken today show him covered in a dark hoodie being led into an Athens courthouse to answer a charge of robbery for the incident two months ago
Police arrested the unidentified 43-year-old last week as he tried to flee the country on a false passport because he had previously been linked to a similar burglary to the one in which Ms Crouch was killed
He is accused of being one of five robbers who tied up an elderly couple and their cleaning lady in the brutal raid on a home in Pikermi.
The house is a 20-minute drive from Glyka Nera, where the three men killed Miss Crouch, 20, and strangled the family dog before making off with 10,000 euros in cash and £20,000 worth of jewellery.
The Athens-Macedonia news agency reported: ‘The Georgian criminal told police he had nothing to do with the break-in and Caroline’s murder.
Caroline was killed at her home in Athens, Greece, that she shared with husband Babis Anagnostopoulos and their infant daughter Lydia
Police say the man matches a description that Babis gave of one of three men who broke into his house near Athens (pictured) and stole £10,000 in cash before killing his wife
‘He has been very apathetic and aloof in the way he speaks to the police about the crimes and about Caroline’s murder.’
A police source said that even if the Georgian wasn’t one of the robbers who broke into Miss Crouch’s home, he is thought to be part of the same network of criminal gangs.
Meanwhile, it was reported last night that Greek police were hunting an Albanian recently released from prison in connection with Miss Crouch’s death.
Greek police said they were investigating whether the robbers had been tipped off about their victims’ plans to buy a 100,000-euro plot of land in Drafi, a short drive from Glyka Nera.
Detectives think the thugs believed the cash was in the house, not realising the money had already changed hands.
Babis shared a tribute to his wife Caroline Crouch on Sunday. Under the photo taken on their wedding day he writes: ‘Together forever. Have a nice trip my love’
Investigators believe this theory is consistent with the burglars’ demands for money even after Mr Anagnostopoulos had directed them to a 10,000-euro stash in a Monopoly box.
Miss Crouch, a statistics student at the University of Piraeus, moved to the island of Alonissos with her Filipino mother Susan Dela Cuesta and British father David Crouch, 78, when she was eight. She met her husband on the island four years ago.