We have obtained more than a dozen reports of this story and below is a précis of them.
The one thing that must be stated is the wide diversity of the ´facts´ in the stories and the way that some were written which condemned Mike summarily without telling his side of the story.
The worst offenders of this were the British press!
Mike Wood, 44, a one-time locally based yachtsman has been sentenced to 10 years and a fine of 434,000 Euros in a Greek court for smuggling illegal immigrants.
Wood claims that he was tricked into it and then coerced to go through with it by a Greek captain.
Recently Wood has been working for a Pireus based charter company and was on his second charter for them, as second shipper/engineer of Elena B (15 metre sailing yacht) with a Greek national as captain on a charter he was told was to be around Mykonos.
It appears that they did pick up their charter of three people who left (back on Mykonos) on the 19the July.
The yacht was then to return to Pireus but whilst Wood slept the Greek skipper made to a bay near Izmir on the Turkish coast.
Wood claims he was woken up by the sound of people coming aboard- 72 of them, mainly Iraqis!
At this stage Wood claims that he remonstrated with the Greek who threatened Wood at knife point if he did not comply with his orders. Wood also claimed throughout the voyage towards Athens the Greek did not allow Wood anywhere near the radio.
Nearing the mainland, the immigrants, not having food or water for over two days staged a revolt and demanded to be put ashore.
They landed on the island of Aegina near Athens.
As soon as the yacht docked Wood claims the Greek ran off and Wood was picked up by the police as he claimed he was heading for the police station to report the incident.
Within 3 days an Athens court had sentenced him.
There are a number of conflicting reports such as the police claim that Wood was paid £127,000.
Another point is that one of the illegal immigrants is an English teacher and so therefore understood the conversations between the Greek and Wood.
He was expected to testify that Wood was not in charge, was coerced and was an unwilling victim. Several reports of the court case state that this witness was screamed at by the judge and that the translations of his evidence were not accurate.
In some reports the Greek was named as George (surname unknown) in others Wood named the Greek as George Patsakis, who according to another report has a criminal record for smuggling.
The judges threw out any evidence from the defence and although it was reported in one paper that the prosecution suggested 2 years the judge sentenced him to the maximum of 10 years.
Wood has appealed against the sentence.
We have been in touch with the British Embassy in Athens and have also tried to contact Wood´s lawyer- but to no avail. It appears that the whole Greek judicial system closes down until mid-September.
If anyone would like to write to Mike the address is:
Kleisti Filaki Halkidas
Halkida, 34100
Greece
We hope to bring you more on this next month.