The court accepted the request to lift the exception of unconstitutionality made by the defense of former Premier Vlad Filat. Lawyer Igor Popa said the given requisition is to be sent to the Constitutionals Court for examinations. The prosecutor and the lawyer in this case made statements for the press after the hearing that represented a continuation of the March 15 hearing, which was interrupted because the accused invoked health grounds, IPN reports.

“Since the beginning of the trial in the case of Vlad Filat, we finally can say that we scored a small victory as the court accepted to lift the exception of unconstitutionality of an article from the Penal Procedure Code, which we consider runs counter to the Constituting,” stated Igor Popa. According to him, when the MPs asked that the pretrial detention should be replaced by house arrest under their guarantee, the court rejected this request arguing that it hadn’t been 30 days since the judgment on remand detention for 30 days became definitive.

“We think we should not way for those 30 days to pass as this norm runs counter to the law by which the Constitutional Court classed a number of articles from the Penal Procedure Code as unconstitutional, in particular Article 186. It is thus somehow illogical to wait for 30 days before appealing to the Court. We have the right to asks that the pretrial detention should be replaced or annulled whenever new circumstances appear,” said the lawyer.

Igor Popa also said that given that this requisition was accepted, the trial should have been suspended, but the court decided to continue the hearings. “This seems to be an abuse to me. How can a case be tried when a norm that is unconstitutional is questioned within it?” he asked, noting that under the law, the Court should examine the application within 15 days.

Prosecutor Adriana Betisor said the hearing was interrupted because the medical examinations asked by the accused for March 15 weren’t performed. The ex-Premier is to have the planned examinations today, March 16.

A new hearing in this case was set for March 17.