Posted: Friday, March 1, 2013 12:00 am
BY BILL McKELWAY
Richmond Times-Dispatch
A Richmond-area man facing multiple indictments in connection with a drug conspiracy involving a half-ton of cocaine has been located in the Philippines after 15 years on the run.
Henrico County authorities and the FBI confirmed Thursday that Nickolas George Spanos, 48, is in the custody of Philippine authorities on separate, unresolved charges there.
Henrico Commonwealth’s Attorney Shannon Taylor said Thursday that it is not clear when the former seafood dealer could be returned to this country.
Spanos seemed to be hiding in plain sight and was described in news accounts after his arrest in the Philippines as heading an international call center that employed 400 people. A profile identifying him as Nikolaos Spanoudis describes him as a vigilante who “helped to eliminate and deter scams, fraudulent charities and unethical behavior in the (Philippine) island of Cebu” as well as organizing charities that fed the island’s poor.
In December 1998, then-Richmond Times-Dispatch reporter Bill Wasson received a phone call from Spanos, who told him he had fled to Greece to avoid drug conspiracy charges that had been brought against him by a multijurisdictional grand jury.
Spanos accused then-Henrico Commonwealth’s Attorney Toby Vick of being on a “witch hunt” and blamed a jealous and angry former girlfriend for lying to investigators. “If he thinks it’s a witch hunt, tell him to come back and prove it,” Vick said then.
“I’m just a bean in a big sack of beans. They aren’t going to find me,” Spanos told Wasson, describing the beauty of Greece and his ability to hide. “I look just like everybody on the street.”
Authorities said Thursday that questions arose about Spanos in the Philippines over the validity of passport documents and shifting identities even in the face of Spanos’ willingness to pose for pictures there to broadcast his outreach efforts to the poor.
In Henrico, Spanos had ties through his family to several Greek restaurants, but a mounting investigation of the cocaine trade singled him out as a key player in a drug operation that focused on well-to-do, middle-class people.
Shortly after Spanos fled Henrico, he was indicted with three other individuals for conspiracy to distribute 600 kilograms, or 1,320 pounds, of cocaine over the previous decade.
“It was the middle- and upper middle-class echelon of Richmond — doctors, lawyers, businessmen,” Spanos told Wasson, saying that he fled the country rather than cooperate with Vick and testify against his friends.
“The choice is staying free or going through all the hassle,” Spanos said. He accused Vick of being heavy-handed and threatening family members, but a sister of Spanos’ said Vick had been fair and was “just doing his job.”
Publicity about Spanos in the Philippines indicates he began living there in 2008, but there are references in promotional material about Spanos frequently traveling to Greece for business. Spanos’ relatives in Richmond could not be reached or did not return messages.
Vick said in an email Thursday that he was aware that Spanos had been arrested; he had predicted in 1999 that it would happen. “I’m fully confident that Nick Spanos will stand trial in Henrico Circuit Court,” Vick said then.
When that will be remains a matter of conjecture, and it could not be determined Thursday whether Spanos has retained a lawyer to handle his case. In 1998, before he fled, those duties fell to longtime defense lawyer Murray J. Janus, who died in January at the age of 74.