Greek ex-sprinters’ trial finally opens

The perjury trial of two Greek former sprint stars who caused one of the biggest scandals of the Athens 2004 Olympics opened on Friday after four years of deferral, a justice source said.

Costas Kenteris and Katerina Thanou are charged with falsely claiming that a motorcycle accident led them to miss a doping test on the eve of the Games.

The athletes, respectively 37 and 35 years old and now retired, are also accused of having encouraged medical staff to issue false certificates on their alleged injuries from the accident.

Kenteris, 200m gold medal winner in the 2000 Sydney Olympics and Thanou, 100m silver medallist in Sydney, were kicked out of the Athens Games for missing the pre-competition doping test.

They did not appear in court on Friday and were represented by lawyers.

The trial will resume on Tuesday.

If found guilty, the pair face a maximum sentence of under a year in prison, which will probably be suspenced and can be bought off.