The October 18 searches carried out at the homes of employees of a real estate company were conducted in a fake case and there were no legal reasons for those acts, considers private detective Anatolie Postică, ex-head of the Internal Protection and Anticorruption Division of the Ministry of the Interior.

In a news conference at IPN, Anatolie Postică, who is an anticorruption expert, said the ordinance to carry out searches was issued based on a report on a criminal group that allegedly avoided paying taxes, compiled by an officer of the National Investigation Inspectorate. In reality, there was only a denouncing statement of an employee of the Ministry of the Interior, who said that he paid €1,000 in advance, but the problem with his apartment wasn’t solved and the advance was paid back to him.

The detective related that in the morning of October 18, a number of employees of the real estate company had their homes searched based on an ordinance that no longer included the phrase “organized crime”, but stipulated the sum of €1,000. It was ordered to form an investigation group consisting of about 50 representatives of the law enforcement authorities, including prosecutors and police officers.

Anatolie Postică noted the list of those searched included a lawyer on probation and even his parents. Nothing illegal was ultimately found. Almost two months have passed since the searches and none of those persons was given a legal status.

“Finally, the Appeals Court passed decisions to drop those actions. There are three decisions to class the search authorizations as unfounded by now. I think all the 15 authorizations will be dismissed as groundless. I now wonder, as a citizen, why did they engage about 50 persons in an alleged case of tax evasion of €180? Do you imagine what budget costs were incurred? To find nothing. I think those persons will not stop and will seek damages. It’s interesting who will pay them – from the budget, prosecutors,” stated Anatolie Postică.