Ex-senator Dan Sova, sentenced to 3 years in prison in the CET Govora file, final ruling

The High Court of Cassation and Justice (ICCJ – Supreme Court) 5-judge panel has sentenced former Senator Dan Sova to 3 years in prison in the CET Govora file. The ruling is final. The Supreme Court had a first ruling in this file in September 2017, sentencing Sova to three years in jail for influence peddling.

Former CET Govora manager, Mihai Balan, was sentenced to 3 years, suspended sentence and 60 days of unpaid work for the benefit of the community, ziare.com informs.

At the last hearings, the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) requested a 9 years sentence with imprisonment.

The DNA prosecutor pleaded before the court that Sova started the offences in 2011, when he claimed money in exchange for an intervention to Mihai Balan for concluding a contract with CET Govora. The prosecutor added that, besides the indisputable evidence, the defendant’s procedural conduct is an important element which leads to the need for increasing the sentence.

At the last hearings, Balan and Sova have pleaded not guilty and requested to be acquitted.

Senator Dan Sova was indicted by the National Anti-Corruption Directorate (DNA) in 2016 in the file he is accused of bribe taking EUR 100,000 for concluding several contracts between CET Govora and a law firm.

During October 2011 and July 2014 Dan Sova claimed money and received EUR 100,000 from the denouncer, in exchange for influence peddling to Mihai Balan for concluding contracts of legal assistance with a certain law firm, amounting to EUR 10,000 per month.

The investigators mention that such contracts were not needed, as at the time CET Govora SA already had a law department with six legal advisers. Mihai Balan produced damages of RON 1,301,410 to the company.

“During 2006-2008, Dan Sova convinced Mihai Balan and Mihai Balanto to conclude two agreements for legal assistance in the terms imposed by him, in breach of duties or the legal provisions on procurement in force at the time. Specifically, on March 1, 2006 and on March 19, 2008, SC CET Govora concluded with the Law Firm ‘Sova and Associates’ two separate contracts for legal advice/consultation/representation, including the payment of fees for success of EUR 667,409.20 and of RON 1,822,928.24 respectively,” a DNA release issued in November 2016 reads.

According to DNA, the two separate contracts were concluded under the background of a valid contract of SC CET Govora for legal assistance on the same subject, concluded with the same Law firm ‘Sova and Associates’.

The prosecutors claim that these activities have caused damages to SC CET Govora worth over EUR 667,000 and more than RON 1.8 million and led to an unjustly benefit for ‘Sova and Associates’.