![A man wearing a Swastika [Illustrative] (photo credit: CARLOS BARRIA / REUTERS)](https://images.jpost.com/image/upload/q_auto/c_fill,g_faces:center,h_537,w_822/435966 "A man wearing a Swastika [Illustrative]")
The 60-year-old is one of the leaders and ideologues behind Golden Dawn, a Neo-Nazi party in Greece, which rose to prominence with Greece's financial crisis of 2009, becoming the third most popular party in the parliament by 2012.According to BBC News, Pappas was known for his obsession with Nazism, with police finding swastika flags in his home; he has even been filmed teaching his children the Nazi salute.
Multiple sources reported that Pappas was being hidden by a 52-year-old woman at a home in Athens' district Zografou. The unnamed woman was sentenced on Friday to 30 months in prison for aiding the fugitive, but will only serve three months because most of her sentence has been suspended, Greek media reported.
Golden Dawn was founded in 1985 and registered as a political party in 1993. After its rise in 2012, news of the party's criminal activities became more widely known; it failed to enter parliament again in the 2019 elections.
The criminal trial, which has been referred to by multiple media sources as the biggest Nazi trial since Nuremberg, began in April 2015 and was held against the leaders and members of the party.Five years later in July 2020, the trial came to an end, bringing convictions against seven of the party's leaders including the Golden Dawn founder Nikos Michaloliako.
The trial ended with over 50 Golden Dawn members being sentenced on charges ranging from murder, illegal weapon possession and running the organization.