Romanian Court Rejects Preventive Arrest Of Pwr Plant Turceni GM

Early Wednesday, the anticorruption prosecutors proposed the courthouse to place Cristea under preventive arrest.

Cristea’s lawyers accused the anticorruption prosecutors of not observing the legal procedures and their client’s rights.

The judges decided not to issue an arrest warrant for Cristea, who will be released after the 24-hour mandate expires.

Cristea refused to make any statements.

Cristea was detained for 24 hours on Tuesday afternoon, alongside with other company’s managers for abuse of office, at the order of the anticorruption prosecutors in Targu Jiu, southern Romania.

Marian Motocu, the plant’s production manager, will be interim manager during Cristea’s investigation.

Last week, the anti-corruption prosecutors put under distraint part of Dumitru Cristea’s wealth.

Cristea is currently investigated for abuse of office, next to other directors with Turceni power plant.

They are under investigations for having allegedly bought, from a Medias-based company, equipments at over-evaluated prices, causing a prejudice of 800,000 lei (EUR1=RON3.8421), official sources said last week.

The name of general manager in Turceni has been recently mentioned after his wife specified in her wealth statement that Cristea received in June an annual bonus of RON149,000.

Narcisa Cristea, the economic manager of Targu Jiu City Hall in south Romania, wrote end-October in her wealth statement that Dumitru Cristea has obtained net salaries of around RON124,000 between June 2007, when he was appointed the general manager of Turceni power plant, and June 2008.

Narcisa Cristea’s statement also mentions several lands and buildings bought, leased or inherited, several bank deposits totaling RON465,000 and EUR15,000, together with four agricultural lands and three inside-city lands in Targu Jiu town.