Businessmen Victor Țopa and Viorel Țopa filed three appeals at the Supreme Court of Justice for the annulment of their sentences to 10 and 15 years, respectively. According to one of the lawyers, the appeal for annulment applications, submitted after the change of the government in Chișinău, constitute an attempt to an amicable remedy that would avoid a conviction of the Republic of Moldova by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). This comes after the European Court notified the Moldovan government about its review of the cases and asked for explanations regarding the violation of the rights of the two businessmen. Viorel Țopa claims that “these are two files fabricated by Plahotniuc and are considered political persecution by INTERPOL and other institutions,” and the communication of the case by the ECtHR represents “an opportunity for at least a formal revision.” He claims it has nothing to do with the change of government.

On September 2, 2019, Viorel Țopa, through his lawyer Dumitru Pavel, filed an appeal for annulment at the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ) on the case in which, on October 23, 2013, he was sentenced to eight years in prison, with the execution of the sentence in a prison of closed type, for misappropriation of foreign assets and obliged to pay the equivalent in lei of 400,000 dollars to Banca de Economii of Moldova (BEM).

Viorel Țopa’s cases

The Buiucani District Court pronounced the conviction sentence on January 13, 2012, which was later maintained by all higher courts. According to the court sentence, on December 11, 2000, BEM, run at that time by Viorel Țopa, granted a $1 million credit to Air Moldova International.  In order to guarantee the credit repayment obligation, on March 30, 2001, the bank and the offshore company Sparks Management Corporation, de facto managed by Viorel Țopa, concluded a pledge agreement according to which, in case of non-compliance with the obligation to repay the loan, the offshore company’s 400,000 dollar deposit  was to be used by BEM to pay the credit, accruals on deposits and penalties.

The sentence mentions that a few months later, on August 20, 2001, Viorel Țopa, knowing that Air Moldova International is not honoring its contractual obligations, personally approved the withdrawal of the 400,000 dollar deposit by the offshore company he was managing. According to the sentence, on the same day, the amount was transferred from the deposit account of Sparks Management Corporation, opened at BEM’s branch no. 1, to the same offshore company’s account at a bank in Cyprus. Within two days, Viorel Țopa resigned as BEM president.

Andrei Năstase, current Minister of Internal Affairs, on leave from office during the participation in the local elections for the position of mayor of Chisinau, was the lawyer defending Viorel Țopa in this case when it was examined in the national courts.

In the lawyer’s appeals, Andrei Năstase invoked that the sentence of conviction was illegal, because the General Prosecutor’s Office had issued an order refusing to start criminal proceedings on the facts for which Viorel Topa was convicted on October 16, 2001. Respectively, Viorel Țopa’s right to a fair trial was violated, as the Convention for the Defense of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms stipulates that no one can be prosecuted or punished criminally for committing a crime for which he has already been acquitted.

The CSJ finalized the case on October 24, 2013, after rejecting the annulment appeal filed by Viorel Țopa’s lawyer.

On August 28, 2019, lawyer Dumitru Pavel filed an appeal at the CSJ for the annulment of another sentence of Viorel Țopa. He requested a revision of the CSJ decision of May 22, 2019, which announced the final sentence in a case opened for forgery and money laundering in extremely large proportions, in which Viorel Țopa was sentenced to nine years of imprisonment and his brother-in-law Răzvan Paveliu was sentenced to eight years of imprisonment for complicity. Respectively, after adding the respective sentence to the previous one from the case of misappropriation of foreign assets, Viorel Țopa was sent a definitive sentence of 15-year imprisonment, with execution in a prison of closed type. Arrest warrants were issued following the decision of the first instance in this case, and the two were announced in search.

In this file, Viorel Țopa and Paveliu Răzvan were accused of forging Sergiu Manic’s signature for the conversion and transfer of money on the accounts opened at Victoriabank to “disguise the illicit origin of the goods, purchase and use of the assets that constitute illicit income.” He was their business partner within the offshore company Atrium Limited. The lawyers challenged the prosecutors’ indictment and stated that the case could not be tried “for lack of substance, subject, object, claims of criminal character, non-existent damages and other constituent elements of a criminal case.” Following the CSJ ruling issued this May, the lawyer Dumitru Pavel stated that they have filed an application to the ECtHR for infringement of the right to a fair trial.

Victor Țopa requests the revision of his sentence 

During the same period, the businessman Victor Țopa also filed an appeal for annulment at the CSJ. He requested the revision of a decision in which, on February 6, 2013, the CSJ rejected the ordinary appeal and maintained the sentence by which the businessman, together with Vladimir Morari, were sentenced to 10 years imprisonment with execution in a prison of closed type for blackmail. 

The two were accused of having deprived three people of their shares at Victoriabank, through blackmailing and causing them material damage in very large proportions, amounting to 31.5 million lei. According to the convicting sentence, one of the shareholders, Galina Proidisvet, was arrested by two unknown persons in Moscow and taken to the police where she was psychologically influenced, threatened with extradition to the Republic of Moldova, where she was figuring in a criminal case, and threatened with the application of physical violence against her and her close relatives, if she did not transmit the shares held at Victoriabank “in favor of Victor Țopa’s trusted persons.”

 “Threats to citizens G. Proidisvet, V. Turcan and M. Artemenco had a real character, which determined them to accept the transmission of the shares to V. Topa and V. Morari,” stated the CSJ decision of February 6, 2013, by which the ordinary appeal filed by lawyer Andrei Năstase in the name of his two defendants was rejected.

Executing his lawyer’s rights, Năstase pleaded with the CSJ that the case was started on the basis of a law that did not exist at the time when the offence was committed, the relations between the defendants and the injured party being civil in nature, which could be solved in a civil manner, without a criminal character nor criminal content in the actions of the defendants.

The applications to the ECtHR were merged

Viorel Țopa and Victor Țopa appealed to the ECtHR in 2011 and 2012. Viorel Țopa filed a complaint on the violation of rights in the case in which he was convicted of misappropriation of foreign assets, and Victor Țopa, on the violation of rights in the blackmail case. On May 16, 2019, the ECtHR notified the Moldovan Government of the respective cases and those of nine other applicants, the applications being linked in a single procedure. The Republic of Moldova was given a deadline until September to provide explanations regarding the respective cases.

Viorel Țopa: We cannot speak about recovery of trust in justice yet

Contacted by ZdG through a social network, businessman Viorel Țopa, who lives in Germany, stated that the appeals for annulment were filed following the ECtHR’s notification to the Republic of Moldova, and the fact that his former lawyer, Andrei Nastase, is now in the government has nothing to do with it. Asked if he regained confidence in the justice system, Viorel Țopa said: “Now, the cases are reviewed by the ECtHR, the government is notified, and this is an opportunity for at least a formal revision. This is not a “recovery of confidence”, for the moment, there are no signs of it.” “These are two files fabricated by Plahotniuc and are considered political persecution by INTERPOL and other institutions. (…) Andrei Năstase ceased to be my lawyer long before his access to power and before the cases were finalized, though what does a Minister of the Interior have to do with justice (!?) There is something else: Does it seem right to you that the justice, notified by the ECtHR in these cases, can review its own decisions that were guided by a political order? I ask this, because I feel you insist on seeing something that does not exist,” Viorel Topa told ZdG.

Viorel Țopa’s lawyer’s explanations 

Dumitru Pavel, Viorel Țopa’s lawyer, explained the arguments set out in the recently declared appeals to the CSJ. According to him, they decided to file an appeal for annulment even though there is no ECtHR decision that would condemn the state for violating Viorel Țopa’s rights, in order to “not waste time.” The ECtHR release of May 16, 2019 contained clear indications that the Republic of Moldova would be condemned. 

“The appeal is linked to the communication by the ECtHR, which, practically, finds Viorel Țopa’s rights, guaranteed by the Convention, violated. Given that, this communication was brought to the attention of the governmental agent and he expressed his openness to discuss an amicable remedy to this case, in order not to condemn the Republic of Moldova to the ECtHR. The application concerns the violation of the right to a fair trial through the sentence of conviction for a deed on the basis of which he had already been previously irrevocably acquitted. The case regards an order issued by the General Prosecutor’s Office in 2001, disposing the non-commencement of the criminal prosecution. Later, however, the order was ignored and, without being canceled, another order was issued disposing to start the criminal prosecution. This constitutes a serious violation of the national and international legal framework. For this, Moldova risks a conviction. In order to avoid this conviction, we decided to contribute through the annulment appeal procedure, so that the state, through its institutions, repair this error committed with the involvement of the authorities, subdued then by the regime that controlled the system in the conditions of a captured state,” explained lawyer Dumitru Pavel, with reference to the appeal formulated in the file of misappropriation of foreign assets.

In regard to the second file, in which an appeal for annulment was filed and which concerns the conviction of Viorel Țopa and Vladimir Morari for forgery and money laundering in very large proportions, lawyer Dumitru Pavel declared that their arguments include the fact that the Parliament “acknowledged” that the Moldovan law institutions were captured by the statement adopted in June 2019. 

“The second file concerns the conviction in a simulated trial that, practically, is far from being a trial. It is also concerned with the violation of the right to a fair trial through serious procedural impediments that did not allow us to use the evidence that would confirm the innocence, because the accusation itself is based on false statements made by prosecutors and judges, because none of the witnesses confirmed what the judges in their irrevocable acts affirmed. We also see that in this case the state risks being condemned by the ECtHR, which is why we initiated the annulment appeal process. When serious human rights violations are detected in this process, such as described in terms of the violations provided by the Convention and after the Parliament declared that the authorities were then captured, the appeal for annulment was initiated to review these decisions and to issue a legal judgment based on the existing evidence on file, which confirms the innocence of both appellants, Victor Țopa and Vladimir Morari,” lawyer Dumitru Pavel pointed out.

Asked if, being a member of the Central Election Commission and simultaneously a lawyer, does not create an incompatibility of functions, Dumitru Pavel stated that the statute does not imply the suspension of the lawyer’s license, but only imposes the prohibition to attend court sessions during the election period.

Contacted, Andrei Năstase stated that he cannot make statements regarding the cases that are not in his management, considering that from 2015 he no longer represents the interests of the two businessmen and considers addressing him in this case ‘completely inappropriate’. 

For his part, Victor Țopa, informed ZdG through a message that he was busy, but he could discuss the issue on Thursday, September 26.

Marina Ciobanu