On Monday, the Prahova court found problems with the indictment by which DNA Ploiesti sent former heads of the Prahova County Anti-Corruption Service (SJA) to court in December 2016; the case was also in the pre-trial chamber for that day.

According to the court portal, the magistrates found violations in the DNA Ploiesti indictment – the failure to specify the exact time periods during which the alleged criminal activity took place, and the lack of a description of the material documents of the crime related to the illegal investigation in a continuous manner. the form according to which the two defendants were sent to court.

In addition, the court recognized as illegal the requisition of some evidence and the preparation of some materials of the criminal proceedings, requesting the removal of several pieces of evidence from the case materials, including those obtained with the help of technical surveillance measures. According to the decision of the Constitutional Court, the Prahova court also ordered to exclude the evidence illegally obtained and used by listening to witnesses with established identifiers, and to remove this evidence from the proceedings.

The court ordered to inform DNA Ploeşti about this decision, and after 5 days the prosecutor must inform the court if he will leave the order of referral to the court or request the return of the case.

The decision of the Prahov Court can be appealed.

Six years still in the preliminary chamber phase

This case is still at the stage of the preliminary chamber, where it was returned for consideration by the Court of Appeal of Ploiesti in February 2021.

The case sent to the DNA Ploiesti court in December 2016 concerns Kostiantyn Ispas, the former head of the Anti-Corruption Service of Prahova County, who was brought to court for abuse of influence, bribery, abuse of continuous investigation, disclosure of secret state information and theft or destruction of documents, Mihail Emanuel Sagel, on the factual date, judicial police officer, in the position of head of service in the Ploiesti Organized Crime Brigade (blackmail, bribery, influence peddling, disclosure of secret state information and theft or destruction of documents), Ionuc Adrian Radulescu, officer of the anti-corruption service of the Prahova district (continued investigation of abuses), and Konstantin Sebastian Ristya (complicity in the crime of bribery).

According to the DNA press release sent on the day the case was referred to the court, in April 2010, Konstantin Ispas, as the head of DGA Prahova, demanded and received from the informant between April 2010 and February 2011 10,000 euros in two installments and financial assistance for a certain commercial company owned by his relative. The financial assistance consisted of a loan in the amount of 200,000 lei and the conclusion of a purchase and sale agreement for a building owned by the whistleblower in order to enable the company in question to obtain a bank loan. In reality, the money for the construction was not paid.

These advantages were demanded by Ispas to induce the coordinator of BCCO Ploieşti, Chief Commissioner Mihail Emanuel Sagel, to instrumentalize the criminal case in a certain direction to create a favorable situation for the whistleblower, who is investigated accordingly. reasons, the quoted source shows.

The prosecutor’s office also claims that in the period 2010-2013, Kostiantyn Ispas induced the administrators of two companies to create material advantages for other commercial companies (the subject of which is the sale of petroleum products), receiving in return the latter from the representative: useful materials in the amount of 1,500 lei for each of 39 operations with petroleum products, carried out by privileged companies, for a total amount of 58,500 lei; sums of money from 700 to 2,000 lei for refueling a personal car during the specified period; sums of money or diesel for refueling one’s own car in the amount of approximately 2,000 lei per month (starting from 2009 until the end of 2012), re-supply of mineral aggregates operated within the ballast station, equivalent to 45-50 dump trucks; transportation of bales of alfalfa or wheat from the Urlatsi district to the farm actually managed by Ispas Konstantin; payment in the summer of 2011 for vacation expenses together with the family on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, a stay worth 2,000 euros.

In addition, from 2009 to January 2015, Kostyantyn Ispas received significant funds directly from the administrator of the commercial company, as well as indirectly through the supply of goods by his company to companies managed by his relatives. In exchange for these benefits, Kostyantyn Ispas had to provide institutional protection for the businessman and his family, prosecutors say.

In addition, Ispas had to initiate criminal proceedings against the policemen who opened a case of tax evasion in the name of the businessman. Thus, during January and February 2013, Kostiantyn Ispas and Ionuc Adrian Redulescu, officers of the Prahova DSA, threatened and promised to induce several administrators of commercial companies to file complaints against the police officers from the Prahova SIF, who were engaged in the relevant criminal case. Complaints received in this way led to the opening of two criminal cases, in which the employees of the Prahova Police Department were tasked with conducting investigations, DNA reports.

According to the source, on August 18, 2015, during the search of Kostyantyn Ispas’s house, prosecutors of the DNA discovered 13 documents containing information that constitutes a state secret, documents that may affect the activities of legal entities. He had them without a right, outside of his duties. At the same time, 29 documents containing information constituting a state secret, which may affect the activities of legal entities, repeatedly kidnapped in the period from December 1, 2004 to September 18, 2012 in the position of a police officer, were discovered.

DNA also noted that between 2014 and 2015, police officer Mykhailo Emanuel Sagel, acting on the basis of delegation of authority by order of DIICOT Ploiesti, forced the journalist by threatening, directly or through intermediaries, to open criminal cases. and to take certain preventive measures against him in order to force him, on the one hand, to stop editing and publishing compromising press materials against him, and on the other hand, to compromise the judge by drawing up reports on him.

In the first half of 2011, Mykhailo Emanuel Sagel allegedly filed claims through Adrian Ristea, and later accepted a commission of 10% of the amount of money that the company administrator had to return as part of the criminal case. In this sense, in the relevant material, Mykhailo Emanuel Sagel promptly executed the criminal prosecution documents so that the sum of money, which constitutes damages in the specified criminal case, was collected by the businessman, DNA reports.

Later, after the prosecutor’s office at the Prahova court rejected the case, Mykhailo Emanuel Sagel continued to demand from the entrepreneur the aforementioned commission, as well as the processing of 3-4 cubic meters of logs (the operation is estimated at 300,400 lei) and the drying of 0.5 m3 of wood, the cost which was estimated at 40-50 euros/m3, in order to encourage the police officer from IPJ Prahova to quickly solve the relevant case so that he recovers the losses, the prosecutor claims.

On August 18, 2015, prosecutors discovered at Mykhailo Emanuel Sagel’s home 17 documents containing state secrets, documents that could affect the activities of legal entities, which the latter illegally possessed outside of official powers. At the same time, in the period from February 15, 2005 to September 8, 2010, 39 documents containing state secrets, which may affect the activities of legal entities repeatedly kidnapped by law enforcement officers, were discovered. (Source: Agerpres)