Police’s organized crime unit twice intervened to warn Giorgos Moschouris of active plots to take his life, according to multiple sources familiar with the investigation, months before the senior Greek Mafia figure was fatally shot in April 2025 in the northern Athens suburb of Halandri.
The 55-year-old, known by the nickname “Thamnakias,” was killed in a hail of gunfire when assailants armed with Kalashnikov rifles opened fire, hitting him with 54 bullets. The revelations emerged following recent arrests linked to his killing.
According to information received by officers from the so-called “Greek FBI,” an attack against Moschouris had been planned at an entertainment venue he was known to frequent regularly. In an effort to prevent the assassination, police urgently summoned him to their headquarters (GADA), where investigators warned him during two private meetings in September and October 2024 that contract killings had been ordered against him.
Moschouris reportedly responded by insisting he had withdrawn from criminal activity and declined to enter a witness protection program.
He was considered one of the most influential figures in Greece’s organized crime underworld and had previously been convicted as the leader of a protection racket targeting dozens of businesses, mainly in the southern suburbs of Athens. Authorities also linked him to the fuel trade.
