GREECE Law and Practice Contributed by: Ilias G. Anagnostopoulos and Padelis V. Bratis, ANAGNOSTOPOULOS
Civil Proceedings Disclosure is not a recognised or established procedure for the exchange of information between litigants in Greek civil proceedings. The general principle established in the GCCivP is that the court acts only upon request of the litigants and reaches its ruling based on the factual allegations and evidence submitted by each party. Consequently, litigants bear the bur - den of proving their own allegations and cannot be forced to disclose evidence in relation to the opposing party’s claims or face sanctions for not acting in such a manner. Criminal Proceedings Unlike the civil procedure, prosecuting and investigative authorities are not solely bound by evidence adduced by the litigants. Once the competent prosecutor has pressed charges and made referral of the case for main investigation, the investigating judge has extensive powers to gather evidence (including requests for pro - duction of evidence/information) in accordance with the provisions of the Greek Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter, GCCP), the Constitution and relevant legislation. It should be noted, however, that even dur - ing this stage of investigation the fundamental rights of the defendant (such as the right to be presumed innocent and the right to avoid self- In urgent and serious cases (eg, corruption, large-scale fraud and money laundering), it is not unusual for enforcement agencies and the prosecutor to take immediate action to secure evidence, by issuing a warrant for search and seizure or by issuing freezing orders, even before any charges are filed or involved persons are called for questioning. Preservation of evidence incrimination) remain intact. 2.2 Preserving Evidence
Greek courts order the unsuccessful litigant to pay costs of the proceedings, which, as a rule, are of nominal value and cover a small part of the actual costs incurred by the winning party. Non-Compliance by the Defendant Consequences of a defendant’s non-compliance with aforementioned court orders could include the imposition of a fine of up to EUR100,000 as well as their personal detention (Article 947 GCCivP). Moreover, a person who tries to conceal, trans - fer, destroy, etc, their property in order to prevent the enforcement of a judgment could be held criminally liable by virtue of Article 397 GCC. According to said article, a debtor who intention - ally frustrates, in whole or in part, the satisfaction of their debt by damaging, destroying, transfer - ring without value, concealing or appropriating without equivalent and marketable collateral any of their property, or who creates false debits of false contracts, shall be punishable by imprison - ment of up to two years or by pecuniary penalty. Asset-Freezing in Criminal Proceedings Depending on the specifics of the case (eg, bank - ing fraud), a fraud victim could accompany their criminal complaint before the competent pros - ecutor with a request for asset freezing against the defendant, on the basis of money-laundering legislation (Article 42 of Law 4557/2018). 2. Procedures and Trials 2.1 Disclosure of Defendants’ Assets Besides publicly accessible information (Land Registry, General Commercial Registry, etc), criminal law mechanisms are generally deemed effective in tracing a defendant’s assets.
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