Former coach Piturca off judicial supervision after Bucharest Court admitts appeal

Former coach of the national soccer team Victor Piturca is off judicial supervision after the Bucharest Court admitted, on Wednesday, his appeal for the revocation of the measure ordered by the prosecutors of the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) in the case in which he is accused of buying influence, told Agerpres.

In the same case, placed under judicial supervision, director of Romarm Gabriel Tutu and Alexandru Piturca, the son of the former coach, are also being investigated.

According to the DNA, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, between March 19, 2020 and September 16, 2021, Romarm director general Gabriel Tutu, acting in violation of the legal provisions, concluded two public procurement contracts with an association of companies that also included one controlled by Piturca; the highly disadvantageous contracts for Romarm provided for the purchase of seven non-compliant machines for the production of protective masks.

"The aforementioned actions caused the National Company Romarm SA a loss of 8,647,584 RON, representing the value of the mentioned machines, the value of the raw material and subsequently the value of related parts and services (outside the contract)," the investigators show.

In a similar context, the prosecutors say that between March 19, 2020 and April 10, 2020, Gabriel Tutu asked executives of the companies involved in the said purchases to allow a friend of his to provide for delivery non-compliant protective masks to the National Defence Ministry (MApN) although he actually did not provide any real commercial activities ancillary to the contract for the delivery of protection products and to perform payments to the latter (40 percent of the profit share) under the guise of a consultancy contract.

"In exchange for these 'services', suspect Gabriel Tutu induced the belief that he has influence over Defence Ministry officials and that he will determine them to directly award the procurement contracts without public procedures, and also take over the products without raising any objections and foot the relevant invoices. In this context, suspect Gabriel Tutu is said to have received 50,000 RON through a go-between," the anti-graft prosecutors mention.

The DNA also argues that Alexandru Piturca would have accepted, directly, the conditions imposed by Gabriel Tutu, in exchange for which the latter would have induced the belief that he has influence over some officials within the MApN and that he would determine them to award, directly and without any public procedures, the contracts for the supply of protection products against the coronavirus.