Last year, the General Prosecutor’s Office decided on 19 criminal cases, declaring that their investigation had been politically influenced during the oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc’s governance. Prosecutors have dropped previous allegations against some accused and defendants, although several cases already had convictions in other courts.

Even though the Prosecutor General’s monitoring group found that their colleagues, and also several judges made politically influenced decisions or based on illegal evidence, today there are NO prosecutors or judges detained for having handled those cases.

In an official response to ZdG, the Prosecutor General informed that the Prosecutors’ Inspection initiated 47 disciplinary proceedings against 48 prosecutors, and “the abusive actions of some decision-makers and some executive-level prosecutors who managed political cases, are investigated in two criminal cases.”

Victor MOȘNEAG

In February 2020, the General Prosecutor’s Office started to verify 38 criminal cases, alleged to be politically investigated during oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc’s control over governance.

PG: Prosecutors’ Inspection initiates 47 disciplinary proceedings regarding 48 prosecutors

Almost a year after the initiation of 38 criminal cases’ review and after the General Prosecutor’s Office decided on 19 of them, there is NO information about the punishments applied to prosecutors, judges, or other law enforcement employees who participated. To find out their names, and to know their punishments ZdG requested information from the Prosecutor General, Alexandr Stoianoglo. The Prosecutor General confirmed that there are no prosecutors or judges convicted/prosecuted, but didn’t disclose their names.  

“After the controls carried out at the two prosecutor’s offices, but also for a series of serious violations, the Prosecutors’ Inspectorate initiated 47 disciplinary proceedings against 48 prosecutors for illegal detentions, arrests, searches, seizures, interceptions, illegal chases, delays in examining cases, illegal decisions on the substance/merits, misrepresentation of the state accusation in the courts, non-appeal of illegal decisions in the courts”. ”Out of the total number of disciplinary proceedings, 48 were sent for examination to the College of Discipline and Ethics of the Superior Council of Prosecutors,” the statement said. 

We couldn’t find the results of these disciplinary proceedings on the Superior Council of Prosecutors website. 

Prosecutor General announces that he started two criminal cases, but the Superior Council of Prosecutors has no registered notifications from the Prosecutor’s Office

Prosecutor General mentions that “the abusive actions of some decision-makers and executive-level prosecutors who managed political cases, are under investigation in two criminal cases“. Nevertheless, the institution does not provide details, “because the investigation is ongoing. Based on the interest of the criminal investigation, at the current stage, the Prosecutor’s Office cannot disclose aspects of these investigations.” In the same response, Prosecutor General “informs that the case of accusing the suspended head of the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office, Viorel Morari, for abuse of office, forgery in public documents, and interference in the carrying out of criminal prosecution, has been finalized and brought to justice at the beginning of 2020, currently pending before the court.” The Morari case does not yet have a sentence.

ZdG also tried to find out from the Superior Council of Magistracy whether, based on the review of the 38 cases alleged to be political, whether the Prosecutor General initiated any proceedings regarding judges who participated in these cases. Several institution’s members informed us that they do not know about such proceedings. “As far as I know, I did not sign such a thing. The President re-addresses all notifications to the Judicial Inspection. Since I exercised this position, I have not signed such a thing“, said Nina Cernat, the interim President of the Superior Council of Magistracy. 

Malic: “Regrettably, the Prosecutor General does not intervene, but who should intervene?”

The case of the former deputy Iurie Bolboceanu is one of the 38 files that were found to have been politically investigated. In October 2020, the Prosecutor gave up the accusation against Bolboceanu, and the court cleared him. The court accused Bolboceanu of treason, and in March 2018 Judge Serghei Papuha sentenced him to 14 years in prison. Although the criminal case is solved, those involved in making illegal decisions have not been yet held accountable.

“The court found with certainty that Mr. Bolboceanu was deprived of liberty, for two years or so, absolutely illegal. The state is obliged to investigate these circumstances objectively and to give us an answer, not to wait until we ask for it”, states Gheorghe Malic, Bolboceanu’s lawyer.

 “All the persons who invented the operative services, those who held the press conferences, later the investigative judges who arrested the man and kept him in illegal detention, the judges who issued the first sentence, the Court of Appeal prosecutors and judges who referred to the arrest of Mr. Bolboceanu, – all of them fall under the criminal law and should be punished”, considers lawyer Malic.

“Regrettably, the Prosecutor General does not intervene, but who should intervene? The judiciary made illegal decisions from top to bottom. The state was captured. All these 38 cases are considered to be political, but I have doubts that it’s about politics. It’s about the abuse of office, it’s about the captured state, it’s about the fact that judges and prosecutors were controlled. So, this is not politics, this is abuse or mafia. All who have been the instruments of this state shall be investigated, and not separately for each case, but in a general criminal case of capture of the state”, considers the lawyer Malic.

Why is Ana Ursachi’s case not closed?

There are other so-called political cases that passed not only through the hands of prosecutors but also the hands of judges. One of them is the former employee of Moldindconbank, Olga Pungă, sentenced by all three courts to eight and a half years in prison. Now, she is free, the criminal case being sent for review. But we lack any information about the prosecution of those who investigated and examined her case.

Some of those 38 cases have no sentence and are only partially cleared up. This is because those that made illegal decisions would be prosecuted. This is the case of the lawyer Ana Ursachi. Prosecutors revoked the precautionary measure against her and closed the case, but did not intervene in the criminal case opened against her. The lawyer Ursachi was accused of complicity in a murder case opened years before, still in 1997, in which her ex-husband was sentenced to 18 years in prison for murder.

Ursachi mentioned to ZdG that the case is not closed because, in this case, the culprits would be punished. Ursachi claims that she will not give up and will insist on their punishment.  

Vieru: The Prosecutor General had at least to disclose the names 

Lawyer Vadim Vieru considers that the Prosecutor General would have to disclose the names of all those involved in the management of political cases. “I think that the names of the prosecutors who handled such cases and the names of the judges who participated were to be made public at least by the Prosecutor General. These judges, prosecutors, and other subjects involved would be held accountable”, considers the lawyer.