A former prosecutor general and six more persons were arrested by anticorruption prosecutors and officers for 72 hours on June 12. According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, the functionaries are suspected of misuse of power when acquiring premises for the PGO at an overestimated price and signing a contract for the repair of these with serious deviations from the legislation.

According to the investigation, the ex-prosecutor general in 2005 ordered to purchase an unfinished building situated at 100 Alexandru cel Bun St in Chisinau at the price of 9 million lei at a time when this cost slightly over 2.5 million lei according to the last appraisal. This was acquired in the absence of a public tender contest and of the required design documentation.

Later, possessing the conclusions of experts, who pointed to serious faults in the purchased building, in the absence of an authorized reconstruction project and of the works assessment document, the members of the bidding group that was constituted by order of the ex-prosecutor general chose a business entity as a general contractor for executing the reconstruction works. The ex-prosecutor general signed the contract in breach of the law.

More than 18.8 million lei was allocated from the state budget for reconstructing the building so far, but the works haven’t been yet finished. Also, the PGO was involved in civil proceedings by the business entity, which claimed over 6 million lei from the institution for executed works that weren’t paid. The circumstances related to this civil lawsuit served as a reason for opening an investigation and taking legal action in this case.

All those arrested were escorted to the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office, where they were questioned. They face up to ten years in jail and ban on holding particular posts or performing particular activities for 10 to 15 years.