Former Interior Minister Cristian David was acquitted by the High Court of Cassation and Justice (ICCJ – Supreme Court) on Tuesday. The ruling is final. In December 2017 he had been sentenced to 5 years in prison by the first court.
At the last hearings, the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) requested the highest punishment for Cristian David, charged with bribe taking of EUR 500,000 to intercede to Buzau Prefect Cristinel Bigiu regarding the property rights on a 15-hectare plot of land.
In first court, the magistrates decided to change the legal classification in Cristian David’s file from bribe taking to influence peddling and the confiscation of the equivalent in RON at the BNR exchange rate of RON 500,000. The judges also ordered him to pay the amount of RON 20,000 for judicial expenses to the state, out of which RON 12,500 in the criminal prosecution phase.
In the same file, Valeriu Roger Niţescu, David’s former chief of staff, was sentenced to six years in prison for influence peddling.
Gheorghe Doliu and Marian Cristinel Bigiu, Prefect of Buzau County, were acquitted.
Anti-corruption prosecutors had seized David’s movable and immovable assets and on the assets of other three defendants in the file.
The former Interior Minister served a pre-trial jail sentence in this file from January 22 to March 20, 2015 when he was placed under house arrest.