Circular of the Prosecutor of the Supreme Court of Greece on the crime of article 285 of the Hellenic Penal Code in relation to COVID-19

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in any retrieval system of any nature without prior permission of the publisher. Application for permission for other use of copyright material including permission to reproduce extracts in other published works shall be made to the publisher. Full acknowledgment of author, publisher and source must be given. Nothing in this newsletter shall be construed as legal advice. Professional advice should therefore be sought before any action is undertaken based on this publication.

Article 285 of the Greek Penal Code contains a provision termed Violation of measures to prevent epidemics.

According to paragraph 1 of Article 285,  a person who violates measure against the intrusion or dissemination of a contagious disease (epidemic) is punished a. with imprisonment of up to 3 years and a fine if danger for animals has resulted and a maximum  penalty of up to 10 years imprisonment and a fine if the danger has resulted for humans.
According to paragraph 2 the same prison terms are imposed if the disease transmitted as a result of the breach/violation.
According to paragraph 3 if the breach resulted in the death of another person the prison term is minimum 10 years imprisonment and a life sentence if the violation resulted in the death of a large amount of persons.
Paragraph 4 provides inter alia that a violation due to negligence results to a prison term of up to two years and a fine.

The Prosecutor of the Supreme Court of Greece stresses out to regional prosecutors in the Courts of Appeals and Courts of First Instance in Greece, the importance of their duty to interfere when such violations occur, by virtue of Circular 4/2020 published today on the 12th of March 2020.