Anti-corruption chief prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi on Wednesday said that “it’s just a matter of time” until runaway Sebastian Ghita would be caught. At the same time, he slammed the Interpol Romani for not publishing Sebastian Ghita’s picture on their website, although police put out an APB on him, as well as the Police for losing the former deputy.
“I believe it’s just a matter of time until Sebastian Ghita would be caught. At least the DNA is probing several information in this respect. I am waiting for the Romanian Police to get involved, to allot resources and to make this defendant’s catch a priority. We’ll see if he left the country or not (…) We are counting on the national police from 190 countries. At the moment, defendant Sebastian Ghita is under an international search warrant in 190 countries,” Kovesi told Europa FM.
The anti-corruption chief prosecutor also disclosed that Ghita is investigated in more files, some of them not public yet, which have been opened including following notifications by the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI).
At the same time, the DNA head informed she had asked Interpol to explain the fact that no photo of Ghita is posted on the Interpol website, although an international search warrant was released by his name.
“The Interpol representative told us that Sebastian Ghita’s photo is not on the website because just a preventive arrest warrant was released during the criminal prosecution and he is thus enjoying the benefit of doubt. We don’t argue that. But after the talk, we checked the website that the photo was revealed in similar situations. The photo of a person searched based on a preventive arrest warrant is published and the photo of a defendant is not. Interpol Romania must explain to us why this photo is not posted. Maybe there is a legal explanation, I don’t know,” Kovesi said.
She also added that it the Police’s job to search for the former deputy. “I respect police officers, their job. We have many police officers working at the National Anti-corruption Directorate. But after the control, I was told that nobody is to blame for Ghita’s disappearance. And the anti-corruption prosecutors were announced about the disappearance 16 hours after he has gone missing. The Police lost him, they’d better find him. They should allot all resources to find him. We see all kind of video footages on TV evening by evening. It’s obvious that people working in a TV are keeping in touch with an international runaway,” Kovesi argued.
On Tuesday, during another interview for Digi 24, Kovesi confessed that it’s for the first time that a defendant under this kind of stakeout is just missing and cannot be found anymore.