Elena Udrea, with one leg in freedom
The Prahova Court on Tuesday admitted the request of former Minister of Tourism Elena Udrea regarding the deduction of the punishment that remained to be executed in the period in which he was in detention in Costa Rica and Bulgaria.
« It deduces from the sentence of 6 years imprisonment, applied by the criminal sentence no. 181 from 28.03.2017 pronounced by the High Court of Cassation and Justice – the Criminal Section, the period from 25.02.2015 on 16.06.2015, representing the period in which the petitioner was arrested preventively and arrested at the date of domicile in Romania. 24.12.2018, representing the period in which it was arrested in the Republic of Costa Rica, the period from 07.04.2022 on 16.06.2022, representing the period in which it was arrested in Bulgaria, as well as the period actually executed in Romania respectively from 16.06.2022 to the day The basis of the criminal sentence no.
The decision is not final.
The former Minister of Tourism is located in the Târgşor Penitentiary, where it was incarcerated in June 2022, after being extradited from Bulgaria.
The route of this process was quite complicated. Udrea was sued in 2015 and definitively convicted in June 2018, but she fled before the sentence was pronounced, being detected and incarcerated in Costa Rica.
Subsequently, in December 2018, the Constitutional Court decided that the law was not respected when the completions of 5 judges from this court were constituted. As a result, the convictions in the « Gala Bute » file were suspended, Udrea was released from the arrest in Costa Rica and returned to Romania.
In April 2022, based on a decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union, the Supreme Court rejected an appeal filed by Elena Udrea and confirmed the sentence to six years in prison. Elena Udrea fled to Bulgaria, but was caught and sent to the country, being incarcerated in June 2022.
In this file, Elena Udrea is accused of coordinating a system by which she received, with her science, amounts of money from the representatives of some companies to guarantee the timely payment of the works financed by the Ministry of Tourism, which she was leading.
The investigators say that the amounts obtained have entered either directly into the heritage of Elena Udrea (in cash or by paying goods and services), or of the Bucharest Organization of the PDL or of the former head of the Romanian Box Rudel Obreja Federation.
Udrea is also accused of leaving officials from the Ministry of Tourism to violate their duties on the occasion of the purchase of advertising services at the gala where Lucian Bute was boxing.
The damage imputed Elena Udrea amounts to 3 million euros.
