Pattakos was born on 8 November 1912, in the village of
Agia Paraskevi in
Rethymno Prefecture,
Crete, He was married to Dimitra Nikolaidi and had two daughters, Rosa and Eirini. His parents were farmers. He served as a Lieutenant during the
Greco-Italian War (1940-1941) and as cavalry captain and cavalry major during the
Greek Civil War (1946-1949). He was a deeply religious man. Pattakos eventually rose to the rank of
Brigadier and was assigned to the tank training centre at
Goudi in Athens. He, along with
Georgios Papadopoulos and
Nikolaos Makarezos, planned and executed the coup on the night of April 20 to April 21, 1967, claiming political anomaly had made them do so. Many leading politicians and journalists were arrested that night and were led to a hotel in Pikermi. Among them were
Konstantinos Mitsotakis,
Andreas Papandreou,
Georgios Rallis, Manolis Glezos. Pattakos was assigned the
Ministry of the Interior. He became also the vice president of Kollias government. Mercouri retorted "I was born Greek. I will die Greek. Mr. Pattakos was born a fascist. He will die a fascist". On 25 November 1973, Brigadier General
Dimitrios Ioannides overthrew Papadopoulos. The following year, the 7-year Junta
came to an end in the aftermath of the
Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The newly restored democratic government of
Konstantinos Karamanlis put the junta officials on
trial with charges of
high treason and
insurrection against
Georgios Papadopoulos and other co-
conspirators. Pattakos, along with the other leaders of the 1967 coup,
Papadopoulos and
Makarezos, were sentenced to death for high treason, following the trial. Shortly after the sentences were pronounced, they were commuted to
life imprisonment by the Karamanlis government. Pattakos spent 17 years in prison. He was released from prison on 28 September 1990 by the government of Konstantinos Mitsotakis allegedly for health reasons and was put under house arrest. He later stated that he did not regret any of his actions during the dictatorship. In addition, he denied that people were tortured during the dictatorship, except
Alekos Panagoulis and
Spyros Moustaklis, who "had it coming". His funeral took place on 11 October 2016, in Crete. Despite his requirement to his family to keep the funeral small when his death came on the news, many people were quick to attend it. Among them was Christos Pappas (member of the parliament and member of the ultra-nationalist party
Golden Dawn) and many others. ==Other info==