The trial of the Fenyő murder did not start smoothly, first the security and then the police had to be notified regarding the son of the second defendant, Tamás Portik. Before the start of the trial, when Council President Péter Póta arrived in the hall, the young man stood in his way. After a short exchange of words, despite the council chairman warning him to get out of his way, Portik’s son poured a glass of coffee in the judge’s face. Finally, Pesti Srácok journalist László Szemán stepped in and took the young man away. First, the security service of the Metropolitan Court arrived at the scene, and then the staff of the Budapest Police Headquarters started recording the data.
In the end, roughly half a dozen police officers escorted him to the relevant headquarters, and Portik’s ex-mother-in-law, the mother of his later wife, was also brought over as a witness.
Both cooperated with the uniformed officers and calmly left the courtroom area. Later, upon our inquiry, the spokesperson of the Central Investigative General Prosecutor’s Office stated that a case had been opened for violence once morest an official.
Even before the trial might begin, Tamás Portik, who changed lawyers almost constantly, repeatedly objected to the identity of his defender. Regarding lawyer Tamás Vincze, he believes that there is a serious conflict of interest between them, but previously he represented Vincze for months during the trial of the case. According to Péter Póta, Portik’s son told him the same thing when he poured the cold coffee on the young man’s face, which also got into his eyes.
Portik responded by saying that he thought the judge was biased and therefore might no longer preside over the trial. He claims that his former assigned defense attorney threatened him, so he also reported him to the police. During the lengthy comments, he repeatedly told Péter Póta that he thought the council president was intentionally harming him, and therefore he should drop the case.
After Portik’s thesis, Péter Póta was the first to react, during which he briefly explained that he does not consider himself biased. Then the representative of the prosecutor’s office indicated that Tamás Portik has been abusing his powers of attorney for a year. According to the prosecutor’s office, Portik is constantly delaying decision-making, and his behavior will probably not change in the future either. Finally, he stated that he saw no obstacle to Tamás Vincze or the previously assigned Linda Danicz giving their defense speech.
According to lawyer Tamás Vincze, it is not possible for him to continuously represent Tamás Portik, the loss of trust between the two is so great, but he cannot say more than that due to attorney confidentiality. Finally, he asked Judge Péter Póta to be released from his assignment.
They don’t excuse the lawyer
After a short break, Péter Póta announced that he rejected Tamás Vincze’s motion to relieve him from representing Tamás Portik. After a long explanation, he added that there is room for an appeal once morest the decision. Tamás Vincze and Tamás Portik also took advantage of this opportunity, and then Vincze announced that he would definitely not start the defense speech. Since Tamás Vincze would not be able to give his trial speech in the next few days, Péter Póta announced that then the right to the last word would begin.
The prosecution, on the other hand, believes that Tamás Vincze will be given the opportunity to speak at the trial, and that he might go to the lawyer’s office for his notes during the break. The defender did not want to use this opportunity, but the opportunity remains until the lunch break. If there is no defense, the case will continue with the right of the last word.
Tamás Gyárfás: His death ruined my life too!
After the break, Tamás Portik announced that his attorney might not come to today’s hearing because he had to attend another session. After that, Tamás Vincze proposed that the police records be requested because of what happened in the morning, in order to investigate whether Péter Póta was really biased.
He told my son he was going to sentence him to life!
shouted Tamás Portik at one point.
In the absence of a defense speech, Tamás Gyárfás was given the chance to speak to the court with the right of the last word. “I didn’t do anything once morest the law. I’d love to use the term innocent, but it makes me cringe, like I really have to defend myself. I’ve often wondered what I’m doing here at all,” Tamás Gyárfás read his statement, then went on to talk regarding his work experiences and the competitions that come with it. As he said, he never tried to overcome them by force, only verbally.
During the trial, I not only denied, but also refuted the prosecution’s allegations. The last encore months have been the most brutal, when you just wait and wait and hope your defenses don’t fall into oblivion.
He pointed out that for years he has been doing nothing but trying to refute the accusations and the evidence. “His death, which I had nothing to do with, ruined my life too!” – he said when addressing János Fenyő, adding that at the time of the media mogul’s death there was no longer any conflict between them. He knows that he will not get his life back, but he hopes that he can still get his honor back.
After that, Tamás Portik might have had the right to have the last word, but he asked for a postponement, because he will explain his position over several days. Portik also asked to obtain the police reports on what happened today, as well as to excuse Tamás Vincze from participating in the trial.
A continuation is expected on Wednesday morning, when Tamás Portik can make his last speech via video connection.
The Fenyő case has been a mystery for twenty-six years
In the lawsuit that started in 2019, Tamás Gyárfás, the former producer of Nap TV, is accused of first entrusting Péter Tasnádi with the killing of his business rival, János Fenyő, and then, since he did not carry it out, he turned to Tamás Portik, who called the Slovak assassin, Jozef He gave the task to Rohác. The defendants deny everything.
The court examined 512 minutes of audio recordings of conversations between Gyárfás and Portik, secretly recorded by Portik, found in the Farkasrét cemetery with the help of linguistic experts. Previously, the court and the defendants might question the two men who contacted Tamás Gyárfás with the audio recordings. One of them, D. István Portik, was an old acquaintance of Tamás Portik, who met the defendant’s partner several times in the early 2000s.
The woman suddenly brought me a bag of children’s clothes and told her that they were very important. It was only years later, when the bag was already in Cologne due to a move, that he checked with a friend what these clothes were. That’s when they found the sound carriers sewn into textiles.
At first, they did not dare to bring it across the border, so it was hidden in a luggage room at the Vienna railway station. From there, he was later taken to the Farkasrét cemetery and then to the police. Even before the material might reach the authorities, the two witnesses wrote down some quotes by hand and recorded a few sentences from the recording on a dictaphone. Back in 2017, someone blackmailed Tamás Gyárfás with these.
(Cover photo: Police action at the beginning of the Fenyő murder trial on January 30, 2024. Photo: Zsófi Szollár / Index)
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