Authorities said the suspect fired at a social security office, then took a taxi to a court building.
ATHENS, Greece — Police arrested an unidentified 89-year-old man after they said he opened fire Tuesday with a shotgun at a social security office and a court building in Athens, wounding five people and later facing attempted murder charges.
The shootings rattled the Greek capital because gun violence is rare in the country and because both attacks happened inside public offices. Authorities said the suspect first targeted a branch of Greece’s EFKA social security agency, then traveled across the city and fired again inside a courthouse. Officials said the injured were hospitalized and out of danger, while prosecutors began a criminal case focused on attempted murder and illegal gun possession.
The first shooting happened shortly after 10 a.m. Tuesday at an EFKA office on Keiriadon Street in the Kerameikos area of central Athens. Authorities said the man entered the building with a shotgun hidden under a coat and went to the fourth floor. Alexandros Varveris, head of EFKA, said the gunman raised the weapon after telling one employee to duck. “He went in, went up to the fourth floor, raised his shotgun, told an employee to duck and hit another one,” Varveris said. The shot struck an employee in the leg. Police officers who arrived at the office applied a tourniquet before the wounded employee was taken to a hospital.
After the EFKA shooting, investigators said, the gunman fled and took a taxi to a court building in another part of central Athens. There, authorities said, he fired several shots on the ground floor. Court officials said four female court clerks were lightly wounded, including several struck by ricocheting shotgun pellets. Television footage showed ambulance crews moving people from the courthouse to waiting ambulances as others gathered outside the building. Police later recovered the shotgun at the court scene. Authorities said no deaths were reported in either attack.
Security footage aired by local media showed a man walking calmly down a street while carrying what appeared to be a short-barreled shotgun. Officials said the suspect left behind envelopes or letters after the courthouse shooting, but police did not immediately release the contents. The man has not been publicly identified by authorities. His lawyer, Vassilis Noulezas, said Wednesday that the shootings were an act of “protest and despair” against Greek public services. Noulezas said the man had worked for decades as an engineer in Chicago, had been hospitalized at a psychiatric clinic in Athens and had been denied a supplementary pension in Greece.
Greek authorities arrested the suspect hours later at a hotel in Patras, a western port city about 200 kilometers, or 124 miles, from Athens. Local reports said he had a ticket for Italy when he was detained. Investigators also found a second weapon during the arrest, according to reports from Greek media. A public prosecutor charged the man Wednesday with attempted murder and illegal possession of a gun. He has not been convicted, and the case is now moving through the Greek criminal justice system. Authorities had not released a full official motive by Thursday.
The attacks triggered criticism from workers and officials over security at public offices and courts. Citizen Protection Minister Michalis Chrysochoidis described the shootings as dangerous and disturbing and said some security failures had occurred. “Some people did not do their job properly,” Chrysochoidis said in a television interview. He also said Greece remains broadly safe. EFKA workers walked out Wednesday to protest security conditions after the shooting, saying the attack reflected public frustration with understaffed services. Court employee groups also pointed to long-running concerns about screening and security inside judicial buildings.
Stratis Dounias, head of the Athens Judicial Employees Union, said early information showed the gunman appeared to have fired toward the floor inside one of the court offices. The pellets then ricocheted, wounding employees nearby. The court shooting brought emergency vehicles to the building and sent workers and visitors outside as police secured the scene. In the EFKA office, the wounded employee’s injury to the leg was the most serious wound publicly described by authorities. Health officials said the injured people were treated at a hospital and were not in life-threatening condition.
The case also renewed attention on Greece’s strict gun rules and its relatively low level of public gun violence. Firearm ownership is allowed in Greece but regulated, and shootings inside public buildings are unusual. That made the suspect’s age, the two locations and the use of a shotgun stand out in early coverage of the case. Police said the first attack occurred at a social security office serving members of the public, while the second struck a court building where clerks and visitors were working during regular hours.
As of Thursday, the suspect remained accused but not convicted. Greek authorities had confirmed the charges, the two shooting scenes and five wounded people, while investigators continued reviewing the suspect’s writings, weapons and movements before his arrest in Patras.
Author note: Last updated April 30, 2026.