IMPARȚIALITATE·INTEGRITATE·EFICIENȚĂ
December, 23th, 2022
No. 1138/VIII/3
Press release
In the case communicated through the press release no. 784/VIII/3 from August 30th 2022, the prosecutors with the National Anticorruption Directorate – the Section for combating the offences assimilated to those of corruption ordered that the Bucharest Tribunal should be notified with the following facts:
a plea guilt agreement concluded with the defendant DUMITRESCU DAN, acting as a councillor to the cabinet of a secretary of state within the Ministry of Health, at the time the acts were committed, and as the Secretary of State within the Ministry of Investments and European Projects at the time of the indictment, charged with the offence of influence peddling through repeated acts (four material acts),
an indictment concerning a defendant businessman, charged with three offences of influence peddling.
In the above-mentioned documents, the prosecutors described the following state of facts:
Between February and August 2016, the defendant Dumitrescu Dan, as a councillor within the Ministry of Health whose main task was to "Coordinate the European Projects Implementation Unit, Relations with the Parliament", allegedly claimed undue benefits (amounts of money and other services, including the employment of his wife as a psychologist in a project financed from grants) from a businessman (a witness in the case) and allegedly received from him, directly or through a middleman, the total amount of 67,000 lei.
The defendant Dumitrescu Dan allegedly claimed and received the respective benefits in the context in which he allegedly promised the witness to use his alleged influence he claimed to have on some decision-making officials within a national agency and within several ministries, in order to access, approve and carry out some projects financed from European grants for an association owned by the witness, under advantageous conditions, as well as to help him with unblocking of some amounts of money for other ongoing projects.
Between August 2015 and January 2016, the businessman with the status of defendant in this case allegedly proposed to the same witness to participate in several tenders organized by his company in order to obtain European grants, assuring him that he would be awarded with the amounts, thanks to the alleged influence that the former claimed to have over some civil servants working in several ministries. In exchange for winning the tenders, the defendant allegedly demanded the witness to pay some amounts of money between 34,000 euro and 300,000 lei.
It is noteworthy that two of the tenders were cancelled, and in the case of the third one, won by the witness's company, after the execution of the contract and the collection of the European funds, the witness refused to pay to the defendant the previously claimed amount of 300,000 lei.
With reference to the plea agreement concluded with the defendant Dumitrescu Dan, in the presence of the lawyer, the defendant expressly declared that he admits the perpetration of the act he was charged with, accepts the legal framework for which the criminal action was initiated and agrees with the manner and the amount of the applied punishment, as well as the form of its execution, namely the punishment of 1 year and 4 months imprisonment with the suspension of the execution of the punishment for a trial period of 2 years.
It should be mentioned that this stage of the criminal proceedings represents, according to the Criminal Procedure Code, the completion of the criminal investigation and the referral of the indictment to the court, for trial, a situation that cannot, under any circumstances, infringe the principle of presumption of innocence.
It is worth mentioning that the present press release was drawn up according to article 28 paragraph 4 of the Guide of good practices regarding the relationship of the judicial system with the media, approved by the Decision no. 197/2019 of the Plenum of the Superior Council of Magistracy.
THE INFORMATION AND PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICE