13.09.2012
PRESS RELEASE
The information and press release bureau within the Prosecutors Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice is authorized to let the public opinion the following:
The prosecutors of the Section of the criminal investigations from the Prosecutors Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice have indicted the following defendants: Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu, Luca Liviu, Țurcan Octavian, Mihai Sorin, Bohâlțeanu Ioan, Negrutzi Bogdan Radu, Șupeală Gheorghe, Rino Raichovich Graziano, Anagnastopol Zizi, Râmboacă Mihai Viorel, Râmboacă Răzvan Florin și Brașoveanu Daniela Lăcrămioara.
The charges are as follows: embezzlement and money laundering and the registered prejudice to the injured party S.C. Petromservice S.A is 83.518.369,96 euro, as it resulted from the financial expertise ordered in this case.
According to the evidence in this case, during 2005, the defendant LUCA LIVIU, became, in an indirect way, the main stock holder of S.C. Petromservice S.A (the name of the company changed in April 2008 to S.C. PSV Company S.A). This quality was achieved by acquiring 49.35% of the stocks of the company. The purchase was operated through ELBAHOLD LTD (registered in Cyprus), where the defendant was a real beneficiary, in the sense mentioned by the Law 656/2002 for the money laundering and of the Directive 2005/60/CE.
As such, the defendant LUCA LIVIU controlled the future activity of S.C. Petromservice S.A by using the voting prerogatives of ELBAHOLD LTD within the General Assembly of the Stockholders, which allowed him to designate the preferred persons in the Board of Directors, general director and financial director (the defendants Mihai Sorin, Bohâlțeanu Ioan, Negrutzi Bogdan Radu, Șupeală Gheorghe and Rino Raichovich Graziano and Anagnastopol Zizi).
The evidence shows that the defendant LUCA LIVIU was helped to manage the company by the defendant VINTU SORIN OVIDIU, who financed the taking over of the package of stocks. An important role in the administration/management of S.C. Petromservice S.A was held also by the defendant TURCAN OCTAVIAN, a close acquaintance of VINTU SORIN OVIDIU, who used to be the intermediary for the connection that the defendants had with companies registered in Cyprus which were also controlled through the banks in this country.
During 2007, S.C. Petromservice S.A, sold its division in charged with the oil business for which it cashed in around 325 mil euro. Because, in that period, there were a few legal actions against the company started by the employees for arrear salaries recognized as such by the courts of law, the defendant LUCA LIVIU decided that all of the companys cash flow (idle money) to be transferred to the patrimony of a company controlled by Vintu Sorin Ovidiu, in order to avoid that the money gets to the employees or to that it is distributed to the minority share holders.
The evidence in this case shows that, in order to achieve his goal, the defendant, with the help of the defendants Vintu Sorin Ovidiu and Turcan Octavian, have conceived a plan to transfer the amounts from the accounts of SC Petromservice SA to the accounts of some off shore companies controlled by the above mentioned defendants, using the pretext of buying some shares from the stock market.
Hence, from the evidence, it resulted that during 2008-2009, the defendants Luca Liviu, as majority share holder, Mihai Sorin, BOHÂLȚEANU IOAN, NEGRUTZI BOGDAN, ȘUPEALĂ GHEORGHE, RINO RAICHOVICH, as members of Board and ANAGNASTOPOL ZIZI as financial director of S.C. Petromservice S.A have prepared the closing of several contracts through which the injured party acquired shares from the stock market, shares emitted by 7 companies from Republic of Moldova, with a price 9 times higher than the normal price of these shares at that time in the Stock Market of Moldova. The purpose of these transactions was to transfer that all the amounts in the possession of the defendants VÎNTU SORIN OVIDIU and ȚURCAN OCTAVIAN.
In this manner, S.C. Petromservice S.A paid 94.325.439,75 euro for shares it could have bought for 10.807.069,79 euro if the transaction would have been operated through the Stock Market directly.
The shares were bought from the Stock Market by the defendants VÎNTU SORIN OVIDIU and ȚURCAN OCTAVIAN, using amounts of money given in advance by the injured party and were sold again after a few days to S.C. PETROMSERVICE S.A at prices, sometimes, 50 times bigger. The evidence in this case clearly proves that this trade did not benefit the injured party, but was a mean of trafficking the assets of the injured party in order to benefit to other persons.
The contracts have been concluded just before the company declared bankruptcy, considering that the defendants were well aware of the fact that the debts towards the employees could not be paid and that bankruptcy was imminent.
The evidence shows that the defendants Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu and Țurcan OCTAVIAN have contributed to trafficking the assets from the patrimony of the injured person by conceiving the financial mechanism, making available the foreign companies which have been used as intermediary in the procurement of the stocks, by identifying the Moldavian companies whose stocks were to be bought and by making possible all the formalities for the transactions. All the companies which have served as intermediaries for acquiring the stocks were controlled by the defendants Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu and Țurcan Octavian, which were real beneficiaries of these societies, according to the data available in this case.
Hence, the defendants Luca Liviu, Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu and Țurcan Octavian controlled both the buyer and the sellers of the stocks, which allowed them to establish in an arbitrary manner the paid price and to transfer the money from the patrimony of S.C. Petromservice S.A to their own patrimonies (personal accounts of Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu or accounts of other companies controlled by the defendants VÎNTU SORIN OVIDIU, LUCA LIVIU and ȚURCAN OCTAVIAN).
The transfer was realized through repeated operations which were meant to conceal the origin of the money and to reintroduce it in commercial circuit in Romania after having been recycled under the appearance of financing given to Romanian legal persons controlled indirectly by VÎNTU SORIN OVIDIU, especially S.C. IMOBILIAR NETWORK S.A and S.C. REALITATEA MEDIA S.A.
The money have been transferred using shuttle financial operations, repeatedly, structured in several links which helped the recycling through repeated transfers between the companies controlled by the defendants. In some situations, the same amount was transferred 5 times through the accounts of the same companies within one month just to create the illusion of 5 different payments.
The evidence used in this case while undergoing the criminal investigation has shown that the defendants Râmboacă Mihai Viorel, Râmboacă Răzvan Florin and Brașoveanu Daniela Lăcrămioara have helped the criminal activity described above by endorsing the evaluation reports for the companies from Moldova, breaching the specific norms and rules of their activity and they have attested circumstances which were not real in order to distort the value of the companies from Moldova. As such, it was meant that the defendants were not to be liable because the above mentioned reports were supposed to be a justification of the price paid, if there would have ever been a control.
By the controlled bankruptcy of the company, the employees were indirectly injured as they could not cash in their rights attested by the courts of law and also the other creditors of the company who could not capitalize their debts. According to the definitive table of debts, PSV COMPANY S.A had total debts of about 150 millions euro, out of which 98 millions euro towards the state budget.
Also, indirectly the minority stock holders of S.C. Petromservice S.A have been injured (almost 72.000 members of the Employees Association from SNP Petrom S.A and over 7.000 stock holders of private persons) as they did not cash in any amount as a result of the sell of the oil services and as value of their shares was diminished.
The final beneficiaries of the amounts with which the patrimony of injured person was diminished can be seen in the following graphic representation:
To conclude, considering the evidence in the case, the prosecutors from the Section for criminal investigation from the Prosecutors Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice have indicted the following defendants:
1. Luca Liviu, for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
2. Mihai Sorin, for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
3. Șupeală Gheorghe, for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
4. Negrutzi Bogdan for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
5. Bohâlțeanu Ioan, for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
6. Raicovich Rino Graziano for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
7. Anagnastopol Zizi, for embezzlement according to art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 Criminal code (Cc) , applying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.;
8. Vîntu Sorin Ovidiu for complicity to embezzlement according to art.. 26 C.c, applying also art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 from C.c. applying also art. 41 alin. 2 from C.c and for money laundering according to art. 23 alin. 1 lit. a from Law nr. 656/2002 aplying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c. and art. 33 lit. a C.c.;
9. Țurcan Octavian, for complicity to embezzlement according to art.. 26 C.c, applying also art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 from C.c. applying also art. 41 alin. 2 from C.c and for money laundering according to art. 23 alin. 1 lit. a from Law nr. 656/2002 aplying also art. 41 alin. 2 C.c.
10. Râmboacă Mihai Viorel, for complicity to embezzlement according to art.. 26 C.c, applying also art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 from C.c. applying also art. 41 alin. 2 from C.c
11. Rîmboacă Răzvan Florin, for complicity to embezzlement according to art.. 26 C.c, applying also art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 from C.c. applying also art. 41 alin. 2 from C.c
12. Brașoveanu Daniela Lăcrămioara, for complicity to embezzlement according to art. 26 C.c, applying also art. 2151 alin. 1, 2 from C.c. applying also art. 41 alin. 2 from C.c
While working in this case, the prosecutors from the Section for criminal investigation have had the technical support and intelligence from the Romanian Intelligence Service and have cooperated with the Romanian FIU.
The case was sent to the Bucharest Tribunal.