Lawyer Andrei Bazatin invokes flaws in the legation concerning forced eviction. He said that his client purchased a building for the purpose of developing a business in Cotiujenii Mari village of Șoldănești district last autumn. The manager of a limited liability company refuses to free the given building that he had rented from the former owner. The lease expired in December 2021, but the lessee filed a lawsuit in order to delay the process of freeing the building that belongs to Ana Cernopolc. Such situations are also due to legislative shortcomings that need to be corrected during the justice sector reform.
In a news conference hosted by IPN, the lawyer said that lessee Gheorghe Cojocari, through the agency of an Ltd, abusively uses a building that does not belong to him for commercial purposes. He is also not authorized by the owner to use it.
On October 15, 2021 Ana Cernopolc purchased a compound consisting of a building and a lot. After Ana Cernopolc signed the sale and purchase agreement and had her ownership right recorded in the Real Estate Register, she learned that the building has been used by an Ltd controlled by a local businessman, Gheorghe Cojocari, who signed a lease with the former owner of the building. Even if the lease expired in December 2021, the manger refuses to free the building and even filed a civil lawsuit against Ana Cernopolc and the former owners.
“The hearings in this lawsuit brought by Gheorghe Cojocari are permanently put off on different pretexts – either because the lawyer for Cojocari had his wedding party and was to go on honeymoon or because judge Lavchuk went on unplanned leave, etc.,” said the lawyer. In March 2022, having made use of all the preliminary ways, Ana Cernopolc filed a lawsuit for having Cojocari evicted from her building. But the Șoldănești branch of the Orhei Court, at Cojocari’s request, suspended the examination of this lawsuit until the settlement of the suit brought by Cojocari.
On March 23, Ana Cernopolc filed a complaint against the illegal actions of Cojocari to the Șoldănești Prosecutor’s Office. As a result, the institution started a criminal case over appropriation and Gheorghe Cojocari faces 8 to 15 years in jail for his deeds. However, the Prosecutor’s Office hasn’t taken any action to investigate this case so far and hasn’t informed Ana Cernopolc as the complainer about the taken investigative measures. The investigation body and responsible officers refuse to answer the phone calls and the inquiries.
“The absence of a legal remedy for examining such lawsuits concerning eviction from abusively used buildings with celerity and the inaction of the courts of law and investigation bodies lead to the continuous violation of the ownership right of Ana Cernopolc. She cannot make use of her ownership right as an evidently groundless lawsuit needs to be dealt with by three courts first. In the Republic of Moldova, this implies examination for an indefinite period of time,” stated lawyer Andrei Bazatin.
The conference forms part of the series of conferences held as part of IPN News Agency’s project “Support for the Justice Reform through multimedia coverage of cases of alleged injustice”. The Agency does not bear responsibility for the public statements made in the public sphere by the organizers of news conferences. IPN News Agency gives the right of reply to persons who consider they were touched by the news items produced based on statements of the organizers of the given news conference, including by facilitating the organization of another news conference in similar conditions.
