Prosecutors keep medical report on Valeriu Boboc's death secret, lawyers

Lawyers of Valeriu Boboc's family, the man who died after the April 7 protests, accuse prosecutors of keeping secret the repeated medical examination made by a European coroner, Info-Prim Neo reports. Professor Derrick John Pounder presented his medical examination on June 29, but has not been submitted to lawyers. Different pretexts were brought about to keep the results secret, one of the lawyers, Veaceslav Turcan, told a news conference on July 7. Turcan considers the rights of the defense were violated, and not to allow erroneous interpretations of the report, the lawyers will ask the professor for a copy. The defense says the report should have been communicated to them by the investigators within three days. “Although the lawyers asked for this report repeatedly during this period, only on the fourth day they received an answer from prosecutor Ion Matusenco, announcing they were denied the access to it. Matusenco argues he will communicate the report only when the conclusions of Moldovan experts will be made,” Veaceslav Turcan said. The barristers are indignant that, although they are denied the access, members of the Communists Party are aware of the information and even comment on it. “Very strange is the position of the General Prosecutor's Office (GPO). If that document may not serve as evidence, why are PCRM members aware of it,” lawyer Valeriu Plesca asks. According to him, they have the impression that the GPO fights with the Bobocs' lawyers, not being interested in unveiling this felony and in finding the guilty ones, what tells of a lack of efficient defense remedies in Moldova. The defense does not agree with the statement of Communist Vladimir Turcan, the chairman of the commission investigating the April 7 events, who said the international expert had reconfirmed the conclusions of the national expert. The GPO earlier announced it had not received the official results of the medical examination on Valeriu Boboc's case. “There is no final conclusion as yet. A report to present unique conclusions on the case has not been presented to the GPO. And the answer the international expert gave the Moldovan prosecutors on the causes of the death of Valeriu Boboc is nothing but an e-document, which does not matches the legal procedures,” reads a communique by the GPO, issued on July 3. Valeriu Boboc, aged 23, was detained by police on grounds of attending the April 7 revolt. He died several hours later. The initial cause of his death was announced as intoxication with an unknown substance.