The Associated Press
SALEM, Mass. (AP) - A Peabody police officer accused of beating his 73-year-old mother unconscious was driven by the taunts of fellow officers who ridiculed him for living with her, the officer’s defense attorney said.
George Sideris, 33, wept at the defense table during a dangerousness hearing in Salem Superior Court on Thursday. Sideris is being held at the Middleton jail after being arraigned last month for beating Melpomeni Sideris on her shoulders and head on Thanksgiving Day, before calling for medical help.
The beating left her in a coma for several weeks. She is currently recovering at North Shore Medical Center in Salem.
Sideris allegedly confessed to his priest, the Rev. Andrew Demotses, that he began hitting his mother in March when the two argued about whether he should leave his job and sell the family home.
To that point, he’d been telling fellow officers, hospital staffers and relatives that his mother had fallen and may have choked on a banana. But police said he told them his couldn’t lie to his priest.
To make his case that a stressful workplace caused Sideris to turn on his mother, Sideris’ attorney, Edward O’Reilly, read a statement from Peabody police officer James Dickinson, who described Sideris as “maybe a little slow, timid, quiet,” and a “loner” who “internalized” jokes directed at him more than other officers.
“On patrol, George seemed to be the nicest guy,” Dickinson said. “There were calls where I would have reacted with physical force and George acted with restraint.”
Peabody Sgt. Rick Sims told state police investigators that Sideris was more sensitive than other officers.
“Others were picked on, but they shot right back. George never did,” Sims said.
There were “a lot of jokes behind his back” about his mother, his lack of a social life or girlfriend and camping trips he took alone, Sims said.
The hearing is scheduled to continued on Tuesday.