The “Bank Fraud” case, in which the former leader of the PDM, Vlad Plahotniuc, is targeted, will go to trial. The Court of Appeal upholds the decision of the Chisinau court

The Chisinau Court of Appeals rejected on Monday, May 29, the lawyers’ appeal and upheld unchanged the Ciocana Court’s decision of November 2022, which allowed the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (AP) request to authorize the completion of criminal proceedings in the absence of the defendant Vladimir Plahotniuc in the “Bank Fraud” case, the AP reports.

“Today, the Chisinau Court of Appeal rejected the appeal of the lawyers and maintained without changes the decision of the Court of the municipality of Chisinau. Chisinau Ciocana court, which admitted the request of the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office to authorize the completion of criminal proceedings in the absence of the defendant Vladimir Plahotniuc in the “Bank Fraud” case, reports PA.

Thus, as previously announced by anti-corruption prosecutors, if the Chisinau Court of Appeal upholds the contested decision, the criminal case will be sent to trial for examination on the merits.

On 17 November 2022, the Ciocana Court of Chisinau admitted the request of the state prosecutors to authorise the completion of the criminal proceedings in the absence of the defendant Vladimir Plahotniuc in the “Bank Fraud” case.

In the “bank fraud” case, Vladimir Plahotniuc was charged with creating and directing a “criminal organisation, fraud and money laundering”. According to prosecutors, the episode incriminated against him refers to the period 2013-2015, when Plahotniuc allegedly received in his accounts, through resident companies founded by Ilan Shor through intermediaries, financial means of more than $39 million and 3.5 million euros, which originated from bank loans fraudulently obtained from BC “Unibank” SA, BC “Banca Socială” SA and BC “Banca de Economii” SA.

In the criminal case, a seizure was applied on assets whose beneficial owner is Vladimir Plahotniuc in the amount of over one billion lei.

Vladimir Plahotniuc left Moldova in June 2019, after the party he led, PDM, handed over the government to a coalition formed by ACUM Bloc and PSRM, which broke up in November 2019. In March 2020, the US Embassy in Chisinau confirmed that Plahotniuc is on US soil.

The PA requested Plahotniuc’s extradition in June 2020, when the former democratic leader was located in the US, and in September 2020, when he was identified in Turkey, respectively, but no responses to these requests from both countries have reached the Chisinau authorities.

On 1 October 2021, the AP submitted a repeated request to the Interpol National Central Bureau in Moldova asking the General Secretariat of the International Criminal Police Organization INTERPOL to issue an international wanted persons notice for Plahotniuc.