The Court of Appeal has unanimously dismissed an appeal by German national Ewa Izabela Kuenzel against a Nicosia Criminal Court decision refusing her conditional release pending the completion of her trial.
In its ruling, issued on 4 September 2026, the Court of Appeal found that the grounds raised did not establish a violation of her rights or justify replacing her detention with alternative measures.
Kuenzel faces 46 charges before the Nicosia Criminal Court, including fraudulent dealings in property belonging to others, the unlawful possession and use of property without its owners’ consent, and money laundering.
According to the case history set out in the ruling, the alleged transactions concern properties in occupied Agios Amvrosios, in the Kyrenia district, where residential developments were reportedly being built in 2023 and 2024.
The trial began on 3 March 2025, while Kuenzel has been in custody since 19 July 2024. Several applications for bail or the suspension of her detention have been rejected, with those decisions subsequently upheld on appeal.
Kuenzel argued that the length of her detention, delays in the trial and the time required to complete proceedings justified her conditional release. She also cited her clean criminal record and offered to provide €300,000 in cash as security and reside at a designated hotel in Nicosia.
The Court of Appeal found no unjustified delay in the proceedings or failure by the prosecution to advance the case properly.
It said the addition of a witness and further evidence, along with testimony expected from several witnesses abroad, did not support such a conclusion, particularly given the facts and nature of the charges.
The court noted that the entire period of a defendant’s detention must be considered, rather than only the time remaining until the next hearing. In this case, however, it found that the complexity of the proceedings, the volume of evidence and the manner in which the hearing time was being used justified the overall length of detention.
Kuenzel also argued that she had already spent a period in custody which, by her calculation, was equivalent to three years of an eventual prison sentence.
The Court of Appeal said any potential sentence could not be predicted at this stage.
It added that her own estimate of a possible sentence did not establish that the risk of her absconding had diminished to the point that the Criminal Court should reconsider whether alternative measures would be sufficient.
The court also rejected arguments based on rights guaranteed by the Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights, finding that it had not been demonstrated that her detention had become oppressive because of its duration.
It dismissed all grounds of appeal and upheld the Criminal Court’s original decision.
Source: CNA
