6 November 2015
PRESS RELEASE
The Public Information and Media Relations Office within the Prosecutors Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice is authorized to bring to public knowledge the following:
In order to continue the investigations in the case dealing with the fire which broke out in the Colectiv Club in Bucharest, prosecutors within the Section of Criminal Investigation and Criminalistics within the Prosecutors Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice ordered, by way of the ordinance of November 6th 2015, to set the criminal proceedings in motion and restrain the defendants:
· Niță Cristian Mihai and Niță Daniela Ioana for having committed the crimes of abetting the criminal and theft or destruction of evidence and documents;
It came out from the evidence gathered so far that the defendant Zaharia Viorel, authorized pyrotechnical engineer, employee of SC G.I.F.A. SRL, had installed pyrotechnic effects (fireworks) inside the Colectiv Club on the day of October 30th 2015, without complying with the safety measures and the legal provisions relating to this.
Also, after the fire which broke out inside the Colectiv Club on October the 30th 2015, the defendants Niță Daniela Ioana (executive) and Niță Cristian Mihai (director), as representatives of SC G.I.F.A. SRL, proceeded to the destruction and the stealing of documents constituting evidence, so as to hinder the investigations or to make them more difficult, as well as to help the defendant Zaharia Viorel avoid criminal liability.
We will keep the public opinion informed as the investigations progress.
We mention that the initiation of the criminal investigation and the setting in motion of the criminal action are stages of the criminal procedure regulated by the Code of Criminal Procedure, meant to create the procedural framework necessary to gather the evidence, activities which cannot, under any circumstances, breach the principle of the presumption of innocence.