The 1980s were a special decade in many ways. Almost everything was new for the Greek society which saw everything around it changing at a frantic pace.
This affected almost every sector. The same goes for television with the opening of private television channels. Especially in the first years, almost everything that happened, after a while was in every Greek house.
This happened on October 1, 1987 when the famous "Battle of Kalogreza" took place between anarchists and police officers. It was probably the first time that Greeks sat on the couch in their living room and watched on their television scenes unfolding that until then they only saw in action movies coming from faraway Hollywood.
The specific legendary armed conflict, however, apart from the media, also has its police interest after it confirmed for the "EL.AS." the "theory of communicating vessels" between anarchists and criminals while giving the authorities the opportunity to make a peculiar mapping of people who at that time were moving on the outskirts of the guerrilla city.
The dramatic protagonist of that story is Michalis Prekas…
Who was "Caprola"?
He was born in Santorini in 1955. At a young age he came to Athens. Michalis Prekas was one of the children who see the school as a prison and so it was not long before he reacted and made his own revolution.
He started doing what we call "bad company" and soon found himself in a semi-illegal space that showed him how to make easy money without having to work. A short time later, Prekas started doing his first petty thefts.
Somehow it did not take long for him to have his first contacts with the law enforcement authorities. The little Prekas started to gain fame. In the neighborhoods of Brachami, the poor boy from Santorini became known by the nickname "Caprola".
At some point, however, and after several chases by police officers who saved her in the chunk, Prekas falls into the hands of police officers. He was arrested and severely beaten in the Security Detention Center. He developed hatred for the "cops" and that was what would determine his subsequent course.
In one of his prisons, Prekas comes in contact with people from the anarchist space. This combined with half of what he fed the police create an explosive mixture that will ignite almost immediately. Prekas gradually changes course and begins to have more and more contacts with the anarchist space.
According to the police, for Prekas, even that was not enough and he was "looking" for something more. Always according to what the police were leaking at that time, Prekas left the petty thefts, went out illegally and joined the Anti-Government Struggle of Christos Tsoutsouvis!
The "Battle of Kalogreza"
On October 1, 1987, while Michalis Prekas is a fugitive and wanted by the prosecuting authorities, he is in Nun with the also anarchists, Christoforos Marinos and Clearchos Smyrnaios.
They locate a patrol car in which the police officer was not present and decide to act immediately and remove from inside, the motorbike, the radio, ie through which the patrolling police officers communicated with the center of Immediate Action, in order for Prekas to listens to their movements.
One approaches the patrol car and the other two "guard chilies". They are all armed and ready for anything. What they did not expect, however, is that a neighbor who drank morning coffee on his balcony would see them and alert the police.
Within minutes the area was filled with police. The three anarchists were preparing for battle with a few uniformed men and were suddenly confronted by the crews of at least five patrols that arrived there.
Smyrnaios and Marinos try to hide but are located by the police and arrested. Michalis Prekas finds shelter in a two-storey house. When the police realize who has in their hands the simple case of arresting three thieves, it turns into a very important operation.
The police force has more than doubled and among them are now members ECAM which are armed with automatics. Journalists have also reached the point. Most were police newspaper editors along with photographers. There are, however, the cameramen of the television channels who record minute by minute what is happening, transmitting unprecedented images.
Prekas goes to the roof of the two-story house and sees that he is surrounded. He refuses to surrender and goes down to the apartment of the family whose members were inside. He explains to them that he is not going to hurt them and asks them to go to the back so as not to be injured by mistake. At regular intervals, Prekas goes out on the balcony and shoots the police, who retaliate. Other times he seems to negotiate with them and then re-enters the house. This will continue for many more hours until at some point, at one of the exits of Michalis Prekas on the balcony there is a storm of fire.
The bloody end of the long battle
The leader of the operation was Nikon Arkoudeas who had given an explicit order to arrest Prekas alive. From that storm of fire, however, Prekas was seriously injured. Moments later, police raid the apartment, take him out of the car and take him to a patrol car to take him to the hospital. Along the way, Prekas leaves his last breath, writing the bloody epilogue of the long battle.
In the following days collectives of anarchists, comrades of the dead and even the "17 NovemberWith its proclamation they let it be implied or in some cases they openly complain that Prekas was executed in the patrol car.
For its part, h Greek police denies these allegations, stressing that Prekas ended up as a consequence of his injuries. He speaks of confirmation of the theory of "communicating vessels" where criminals and anarchists join forces, places the dead anarchist among the leading figures of the "Anti-State Struggle" founded by Christos Tsoutsouvis (who had died two years earlier in another police, this time in Gyzi), while announcing that the weapons he was holding in his hands during the clash were among those that had been stolen from the Rafina Port Authority in August 1987.
Prekas' partner, Vangelio Vogiatzis, who was pregnant with their child at the time, is arrested for complicity and taken to prison where she will remain for about a year and a half, raising her baby there. When she is released from prison, she starts a court battle to prove that her partner was killed by the police, who in no case wanted to injure or disarm him, but shot him with murderous intent. He is suing three EKAM police officers who in 1992 were acquitted by a court decision which concluded that the uniformed men were acting in a state of legal defense.
Finally, it is worth noting that one of the EKAM men (who, in fact, had previously served in the personal bodyguard of then-Prime Minister Konstantinos Mitsotakis) was initially arrested for arms trafficking, then for joining a group selling nightclubs. shops and finally after being tried and sentenced to prison, he was dismissed by the House.