The Fugitive Accuser

With the American flag in the study and nautical mementos scattered about the spacious hillside villa, it could be the home of a retired U.S. admiral. Instead, it is the suburban Athens residence-in-exile of P. Takis Veliotis, a former General Dynamics top executive and now the company's nemesis. Veliotis, 58, fled to his native Greece in 1983, one step ahead of a federal indictment charging that he took $1.3 million in kickbacks from a subcontractor. Safe from extradition and supported by funds that are not among the $6 million in personal assets that General Dynamics says it impounded, Veliotis claims to be content in his luxurious villa, complete with rooftop swimming pool and garden, tucked into the hills overlooking Athens. "I have a very complete life here," says Veliotis, a heavyset man with beetling brows, a pencil mustache and a tiny hearing aid behind his left ear. "I now have the time to do all the things I wanted to do before."

His restless manner belies his words, however. Though he may have dodged apprehension, Veliotis is not a free man. There have been three attempts on his life, he asserts, and threats to his wife and two children as well. To ensure the family's safety, the villa has bulletproof windows, a sophisticated alarm system and a brace of German shepherds patrolling the grounds.

But Veliotis may be more imprisoned by his obsession with General Dynamics. The son of a Greek shipowner, he was president of a Canadian shipbuilding company before joining General Dynamics in 1973 as head of its Quincy, Mass., shipyard. Rising quickly, he was appointed head of the problem-plagued Electric Boat division in 1977. He fired more than 3,000 workers at the Groton, Conn., yard within weeks of becoming boss, then went on to oversee the building of the first Trident submarine. Veliotis claims that David Lewis, General Dynamics' chairman and chief executive officer, promised to step aside and give him the top spot as a reward for a good performance, but reneged. "That man could charm a snake," says Veliotis, "and he certainly charmed me. He had no intention of stepping down." Instead, in November 1981 Veliotis was elected to the board of directors and made an executive vice president. He resigned six months later in the midst of an investigation into kickbacks that he allegedly took while running the Quincy yard.

Before the indictment was returned, Veliotis left for Greece, stopping only to pack corporate documents and tape recordings of business conversations from his years as a General Dynamics executive. Most of the records have now been turned over to the Justice Department. Veliotis denies offering them to federal prosecutors in exchange for dropping the kickback charges, but no doubt he hopes his cooperation will improve chances for a future bargain. Another motive for releasing the records: a combination of personal revenge and belated remorse. "I was part of a team convinced that the way we did business was just fine," confesses Veliotis. "We were out to make money and to hell with the national interest. In hindsight I regret that attitude very much, and I'm paying for it now."

He intends to make sure that others pay as well. If indictments are not handed down as a result of the Justice Department probe by this summer, Veliotis promises to release still more tapes and documents that he claims will further incriminate General Dynamics' top management and former Government officials. The additional evidence is in the vault of an Athens bank and, says Veliotis, his lawyers have instructions to release the , information should he be "neutralized."