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In his lap he balanced a pile of tape transcripts and letters he had carried out of Greece as evidence. From time to time he ran his finger across the * pages of his old appointment book, picking out entries of meetings with the Prime Minister and other key government officials.
He remembers the meetings with Papandreou vividly, five times alone in the Prime Minister's home at Kastri, once at the home of a Papandreou intimate, Michalis Ziangas. At the first meeting in early 1986, Koskotas recalls, the Prime Minister had a proposal: Koskotas should start a daily newspaper to provide positive coverage of the Papandreou family. Koskotas later put up the money, and the first issue of the paper, called 24 Hours, appeared in February 1988.
The Prime Minister always seemed to possess inside information. Papandreou, says the banker, taps the home and business telephones of such rivals as the head of the political opposition, New Democracy's Constantine Mitsotakis, and unfriendly publishers. "I know all their plans," he proudly told Koskotas.
Papandreou came to assume that Grammi's national magazines and newspapers really served him. Certain Papandreou favorites were hired as editors. Says Koskotas: "All our editors were instructed never to criticize the Prime Minister personally, not even a single cartoon." Papandreou urged Koskotas to neutralize hostile newspapers by buying them up gradually. At their second meeting in early 1987, Papandreou pressed Koskotas to buy Kathimerini, the country's most respected paper; he did, using Bank of Crete funds.
Another time Papandreou had an unexpected idea: Koskotas should purchase the Olympiakos football team. Papandreou, according to Koskotas, wanted the banker to build up the team, so that just before the 1989 election the government would agree to build Olympiakos a new stadium, an announcement certain to be highly popular. Koskotas laid out 4 billion drachmas for the plan.
Koskotas' first ambition, he says, was to enlarge the Bank of Crete. Private banks routinely had to wait at least a year for authorization to open a single branch. But the Bank of Crete opened about 50 branches in four years, and licenses were granted for an additional 20. Sure of his political shield, Koskotas was unafraid to violate banking laws and withdraw huge sums of cash at will. If Koskotas worried aloud about audits, Papandreou was always reassuring. "So long as I am here," Koskotas says Papandreou told him, "you never have to worry."
Koskotas said little of his early years, but he was a young man drawn to risk. Born in 1954 in Greece, he came to America with his parents in 1970. "George was very ambitious," says his wife Kathy, whom he married in 1973. "His mind was always working."
At New York University, that overactive mind seemed to be hunting for angles. Koskotas ordered a batch of N.Y.U. and Fordham University stationery from a printer. He said he wanted to send reprimanding letters to some student friends as a prank. The university believed he intended to create fake transcripts. He was arrested, fined $200 and asked to leave school.