Ex-Connecticut Budget Official Flees to Greece Ahead of Corruption Sentencing

A former senior budget official in Connecticut has become a fugitive in Greece after leaving the United States by boat and plane to avoid sentencing in a federal corruption case, his lawyer and prosecutors told a judge on Thursday.

Konstantinos "Kosta" Diamantis, 70, was convicted last year of extorting thousands of dollars in bribes from private contractors between 2018 and 2021. He had served as director of the state's Office of School Construction Grants and Review, where prosecutors said he demanded payments in exchange for steering multimillion-dollar school building contracts to certain companies and threatened to terminate contracts when he was not paid.

He was scheduled to be sentenced on Thursday in federal court in Bridgeport, where he could have faced more than 10 years in prison. Instead, his attorney, Norman Pattis, told the court he received a phone call from Diamantis on Wednesday night in which the former official said he was in Greece and would not attend.

Prosecutors said Diamantis traveled by boat from Florida to the Bahamas and then flew to London. Although he had surrendered his U.S. passport, he obtained a Greek passport. Diamantis holds both American and Greek citizenship, and Greek courts have upheld the position that extradition of Greek nationals is prohibited, leaving the prospects of his return to the U.S. unclear. Neither authorities nor his lawyer said when he left the country.

U.S. District Judge Stefan Underhill set a new sentencing date for Sept. 30, which he said would proceed whether or not Diamantis appeared.

Pattis also shared with media outlets a 10-page email he said Diamantis sent him. In it, Diamantis denied wrongdoing and accused Gov. Ned Lamont of weaponizing the justice system against him, saying his life, reputation and family relationships had been ruined by the prosecution. He claimed Lamont used the power of his office and a friendship with then-President Joe Biden to create a system of justice aimed at protecting the governor's own wrongdoing, and said he hoped President Donald Trump and the U.S. attorney's office in Washington would review his case.

Connecticut officials condemned the flight. Lamont said Diamantis had betrayed the public's trust and needed to be held accountable, adding that his efforts to avoid justice were shameful and expressing hope that he would be apprehended. State Attorney General William Tong called the disappearance a shameful insult to every person in Connecticut and said it would not deter efforts to protect the state's interests and taxpayer dollars. The state also moved to stop his pension payments.

Prosecutors had asked the judge to sentence Diamantis to 10 to 12 years in prison, while Pattis argued in court filings for no prison time and strict conditions of release. After the hearing, Pattis told reporters he was surprised by his client's decision, saying Diamantis faced a tough day and would likely have received at least four or five years, perhaps 10 to 12. He said he could not support the decision to take the law into his own hands but understood it as a fellow human being.

During the trial, witnesses described handing Diamantis envelopes of cash at locations including a restaurant men's room, a doughnut shop and his home, with some payments referred to in messages as "birthday cards," "pars" and "birdies." Diamantis, who testified in his own defense, acknowledged receiving the money but maintained it was legitimate consulting income. He also faces a separate pending federal criminal case accusing him of taking bribes to quash a state audit of an eye doctor accused of Medicaid fraud.