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Romanian Referees To Remain Under Arrest For 29 Days

A Romanian court of appeals ruled Wednesday Romanian First League football referee Marius Martis and former referee Ionica Serea, placed into custody for 29 days on charges of corruption, will remain under arrest.
Romanian Referees To Remain Under Arrest For 29 Days
05 mai 2010, 16:21, English

The Pitesti Court of Appeals overruled the appeals made by Martis and Serea against the Arges Court’s ruling placing them under arrest.

Martis and Serea asked the Court to be investigated at large and denied any wrongdoing.

On April 30, the two men were placed under arrest for 29 days on bribe-related charges. Serea is under investigation for bribe taking and Martis for accessory to bribe taking and offering.

The financer of Romanian football team FC Arges, Cornel Penescu, and the former general manager of SC PIC SA Pitesti, Liviu Facaleata, were also heard by the Arges Anti-Corruption Department Friday morning.

Although the two made no statements at the time, sources close to the investigation said their hearings might be connected to Serea and Martis’s case.

According to the National Anticorruption Department, on March 18, 2009, Serea received $21,000 from Penescu through Martis and Facaleata. In exchange for the money, Serea, the referee of the FC Arges-FC Steaua match on March 20, 2009, was to help the team financed by Penescu win and to apply disciplinary sanctions only to the other team’s players.

Serea, 41, was demoted to Romania’s second referee division in April, 2009, on account of his poor performance during the Romanian Cup semifinal match between CFR Cluj and FC Vaslui.

Martis was included on a list of 13 First League referees for the 2009-2010 season who were allegedly involved in Penescu’s graft case.

On April 16, Penescu was arrested in the „Football Bribery” case, on charges of influence peddling, bribe offering and setting up an organized crime group. He will be tried under arrest together with Facaleata and the former Central Referee Commission president, Gheorghe Constantin.

According to investigators, the organized crime group also included high-ranking officials of the Romanian Football Federation, several referees, the former president of FC Arges, and others. Investigators said that between 2006 and April 2009, the group committed several serious corruption crimes, in order to obtain financial or material benefits.