data-source-site-code=”premiumctpost” data-mediaos-site-id=”a5b416ad-57d4-4309-add0-eaad6ad4ea6d” data-title=”CT fugitive Kosta Diamantis speaks from Greece” data-caption=”Kosta Diamantis – a Connecticut fugitive convicted of federal bribery charges on the run after failing to show up for his sentencing – returned CT Insider columnist Dan Haar’s phone call from Greece. “I’m in Greece, that’s all you need to know,” he said. Read more: https://www.ctinsider.com/news/article/kosta-diamantis-ct-fugitive-call-from-greece-22438705.php?utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=yahoo_syndication” data-credits=”Footage by Hearst CT Media, Photos by Dave Zajac Interview by Dan Haar, Produced by Carlos Mejia / CT Insider” data-duration=”35″ data-aspect-ratio=”9×16″ data-poster=”https://hips.hearstapps.com/vidthumb/a5ca338f-4882-4b33-b696-538afced6a57/thumb_1080x1920.0000001.jpg?crop=” data-m3u8-url=”https://hnp-streaming-otfp.hearst.io/a5ca338f-4882-4b33-b696-538afced6a57/video_9x16_1080p_h264_hd,video_9x16_1080p_h265_hd,video_9x16_240p_h264_sd,video_9x16_240p_h265_sd,video_9x16_360p_h264_sd,video_9x16_480p_h265_sd,video_9x16_720p_h265_hd/master.m3u8?subtitles=en&fmp4=true” data-mp4-url=”https://hnp-streaming.hearst.io/a5ca338f-4882-4b33-b696-538afced6a57/video_9x16_1080p_h265_hd.mp4″ width=”100%” height=”750″ allowfullscreen=”TRUE” class=”video-player-iframe” style=”aspect-ratio: 9/16; display: block; width: min(100%, 421.875px); height: auto; max-height: 750px; margin: 0 auto” >
Konstantinos “Kosta” Diamantis – a Connecticut fugitive convicted of federal bribery charges on the run after failing to show up Thursday for his sentencing – returned my call from Greece Friday afternoon, or at least, that’s where he said he was and I believe him.
No, he would not tell me where exactly he’s located in the Mediterranean country other than to say he’s in an apartment; or when he arrived, though he said it was very recently. “I’m in Greece, that’s all you need to know,” he said.
Kosta Diamantis arrives at Bridgeport Federal Court in Bridgeport, Conn., Friday, October 3, 2025. (Dave Zajac/Hearst Connecticut Media)
The decision to flee was difficult, he said, but he felt compelled because of his innocence.
“It was knee-jerk and it was last-minute and it was hurtful. I didn’t like what I did,” Diamantis said in the one hour, seven-minute conversation. “I want to come back to the country that I belong to and be with my family and my kids.”
His wish: A pardon from President Donald Trump. He filed an application last winter without the help of a lawyer or lobbyist, he told me. “I am very hopeful and prayful that the investigation that’s going on regarding my pardon…will lead to a pardon,” he said.
Although I had no trouble reaching him, Diamantis said no law enforcement authorities have located him in person or contacted him by phone.
A federal jury in Bridgeport last October found Diamantis, the former deputy budget director and chief of school construction contracts for the state, guilty of 21 counts of bribery, extortion, conspiracy and making false statements.
He has maintained all along, since his 2021 firing when allegations first surfaced (initially about his pushing for a state job for his daughter) that he is innocent of all charges, and was the target of retribution by the office of Gov. Ned Lamont.
Federal authorities launched a manhunt for Diamantis after he failed to appear for his sentencing in Bridgeport Thursday. Free on $500,000 bond, he was expected to receive a term of at least several years, as much as 12½ years.
A database in the U.S. Department of Justice indicates Diamantis applied for a pardon in 2026. Presidential pardons, of course, can take years to arrive and may never happen.
“I was hoping I would have heard back about the pardon last week,” he said Friday. “I was hoping I’d hear about the pardon on the 16th,” meaning the day before his sentencing.
I asked Diamantis if he’s prepared to stay in Greece for the long haul, and whether that or some other option would be his plan if he does not receive a pardon.
“All of the above I guess,” he responded.
“The government has effectively taken everything from me,” said Diamantis, who remains eligible for a state pension that will total about $79,000 this year. State Comptroller Sean Scanlon ended direct deposit for the payments on Thursday and will now hold the monthly checks for Diamantis to collect in-person.
He said his health is good.
“Thank God, my father taught me how to build stone walls and be an agrarian if I had to, you know, and farm,” he told me. “So I happen to be strong enough and, at 70 years old, and do what I need to do.”
He was able to find his way to Greece by way of a drive from Connecticut to Florida, then a boat to the Bahamas, then to London by air, court officials said Thursday. He holds a Greek passport which he sought and received as his criminal case unfolded, which Judge Stephan Underhill requested he surrender; he never did.
“So, do I survive? We survive,” Diamantis said to me. “We’re Greeks. We survive.”
U.S. marshals could face a long extradition process from Greece, especially if Diamantis demonstrates that his case is political. He said repeatedly he does not want to remain on the run as a fugitive.
“That’s not my intent. That’s not what I want to do. I want to come back to the country that I belong to and be with my family and my kids and share the moments that we shared and that we were intending to share into my 70s and until the good Lord takes me.”
We talked at great length about the case, in which federal prosecutors showed that Diamantis received tens of thousands of dollars from contractors, including a former brother-in-law. All of those payments were legal, he said, because they were, in essence, outside work, connecting subcontractors to contractors.
The jury erred in not seeing that, he said to me. Returning a conviction after only six hours of deliberation (the actual number was ten hours) means there is no way the jury pored over the details of the construction contracts at the heart of the case. “Do you think juries make mistakes?” he asked.
Further proof that he did not steer work, as prosecutors claimed:
He had no control over which contractors cities and towns hired for construction projects, he said.
He named people connected with the investigations into his activities, in and out of the governor’s office. “All these people are connected and related in one way or another, and I was passed like a football in a rugby game, amongst people that were coordinated in a particular outcome.”
In a 10-page letter sent this week to his lawyer, Norm Pattis, Diamantis spelled out reasons he believed the governor’s office wanted him out. He cited his opposition to various pandemic orders, and to a contract for COVID-19 testing to a company for which Lamont’s wife, Annie Lamont, was an investor.
“The governor didn’t like my bravado and I’m being outspoken,” Diamantis told me Friday. “I guess I wasn’t from Yale, I don’t know.”
Lamont has said consistently that he took swift action in removing Diamantis after the allegations came to light. He has denied that he or anyone on his staff took any action because of comments Diamantis made.
Diamantis said he has an aunt in her 80s in Greece, but declined to say whether he’s with her or anyone else.
He turned 70 in June, alone, he said, other than a quick cocktail with his daughters. We talked about Greece, which I recalled as an amazing place of hospitality and beauty – none of it giving him comfort at the moment.
“It is a beautiful place, and the people are beautiful people,” he said. “Yes, and it’s a family country, you know. It’s all about family, and I don’t have mine.”
dhaar@hearstmediact.com
This article originally published at Dan Haar: Connecticut fugitive Kosta Diamantis speaks from Greece: ‘I want to come back’.
