Dr Ioanna Gaka, the doctor who carried out plasmapheresis on singer Giorgos Mazonakis, was found to have deleted large numbers of messages and had made targeted searches about propofol and midazolam and their effect on blood pressure, according to the first data recovered from her mobile phone. The findings are now with the investigating magistrate handling the case.

Mazonakis, 54, died on the afternoon of 9 September at a practice on Karneadou Street in the upmarket Kolonaki district of Athens during plasmapheresis, a procedure in which blood plasma is removed and replaced. Gaka and her husband, Dr Ilias Theodoropoulos, who ran the practice, face charges of homicide with possible intent by omission, and both deny the allegations. Theodoropoulos is an internal medicine specialist.

According to information obtained by Proto Thema, a report by the Hellenic Police’s Forensic Science Division shows that Gaka wiped her digital trail immediately after Mazonakis left the practice. She deleted every call and text message she had exchanged with the singer, both before and after the incident, and erased all her communication with hypnotherapist Nasos Komianos.

AI Searches for ways to reverse sedation

The searches found on her phone are of particular interest. According to the report, investigators identified targeted queries on artificial intelligence tools about how to bring a person round from sedation.

In Mazonakis’s case, however, no sedation should have been given in any circumstances.

Gaka also appears to have looked up the side effects of propofol, a general anaesthetic, and of using it together with midazolam, a sedative. Her searches seem to have focused in particular on whether a fall in blood pressure is a side effect of the two drugs. The same data show she also searched for whether propofol comes in tablet form.

Staff group chat discussed the sedation

Internal communication among staff at the practice also corroborates the account. In a group chat, employees discussed what had happened, writing that the singer had been sedated, which caused a sudden drop in his blood pressure and made it necessary to call EKAB, Greece’s National Centre for Emergency Care.

Banned substances at the practice

Beyond the other evidence being examined, police are trying to establish how the substances came to be at the practice, as they are banned in clinics of this kind. The Athens Medical Association has said the practice was licensed only for general medical practice and was not authorised to carry out plasmapheresis.