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The Accidental Spies.

© David Allen

The Accidental Spies, the saga comes to an end!

For some five weeks I have covered the story of the 14 plane spotters arrested on espionage charges in Greece, the group have now been released and are at home with their families and friends, however this is not the end of the affair, in fact this is just the beginning.

The ill fated trip began when twelve Britons and two Dutch nationals went on a trip to Greece, this was no ordinary trip, they being members of a weird organisation that spots planes, they take registration numbers and photos of aircraft! It could be said though they have a strange hobby, they are none the less harmless to everyone else around them; it is this innocence of the world that may have caused their problems in the first place. It was at an air show in Kalamata on the November 8th 2001 when they were arrested on charges of espionage.

It is fair to say however that in this day and age of terrorism and war, especially in the wake of the terrible events of September 11th 2001, that people with this sort of hobby should either refrain from doing it or at least tell the authorities that they plan to at a particular place at a certain time, then maybe this confusion could be avoided and everyone can go about their own life in safety.

The tour was organised by touchdown tours who specialise in plane spotting holidays, in fact the owner of touchdown tours, Paul Coppin and his wife Lesley were part of the group arrested and had been separated for the duration of the enforced stay in Greece.

The ordeal is not over though, as each member of the group have had to pay £9,000 bail in order to be able to be released and will have to return to Greece at some time next year to stand trial for the lesser charges of “Gathering Secret Information“, a lesser charge that still carries a jail sentence of around five years. The group have vowed to return to Greece in order to clear their names of these charges, however it would seem from the evidence that there is not much of a case to answer and it would seem that if there is any common sense here the case should not go ahead and the group should be warned off, along with anyone else who has plans of doing this sort of hobby, as it now known the you can be arrested for plane spotting, then don’t do it!