The grieving husband of a British woman tortured and murdered in a home robbery in Greece has paid a loving tribute after her funeral — as a suspect was reportedly busted trying to leave the country.
Helicopter pilot Babis Anagnostopoulos, 32, posted a picture Sunday of him and his 20-year-old late wife Caroline Crouch as they walked along a beach on their wedding day.
“Together forever,” he wrote in Greek. “Have a nice trip, my love.”
Crouch’s murder at their Athens home last Tuesday horrified the nation after it emerged she had been tortured and then killed in front of her 11-month-old daughter who was found trying to “wake” her up.
Anagnostopoulos had been bound and gagged to a chair by the gang of four killer burglars who also hanged their dog on the gate outside their home. He is believed to have passed out from a lack of oxygen, and later told reporters that they had “begged them not to hurt us.”
Crouch — a UK passport holder whose father is a former British serviceman — spent most of her life on the Greek island of Alonnisos, where her funeral was held Friday, Metro UK said.
Anagnostopoulos was photographed carrying their daughter — who was reportedly threatened but unharmed during the raid — as he told the service that he felt “lucky” for the time he spent with Crouch.
But he said he was “sad … that our daughter will grow up without remembering her beautiful mother, who was the joy of my life,” the UK paper said.
“But through her daughter, Caroline will always be with me and with all of us … You should always look after your loved ones and enjoy your time together,” he reportedly said at the service while wiping away tears.
Anagnostopoulos managed to see at least one of the killers who stole cash and jewelry worth around $18,250, The National Herald said.
The outlet reported Monday that one suspect had been arrested after being stopped using a forged passport trying to leave the country at the border with Bulgaria.
The 30-year-old Georgian man, who was not identified, has a criminal record that includes a violent robbery of an elderly couple in Athens, the paper said.
Police are looking at an Albanian-led gypsy gang thought to be behind at least a dozen robberies around the Greek capital, which is home to a number of organized crime outfits, The National Herald noted.
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