Sorin Oprescu sought after 10 year prison sentence

 

Sorin Oprescu was sentenced on Friday by the Bucharest Court of Appeal to ten years and eight months in prison for bribery, setting up an organised criminal group and abuse of office. The sentence is final and binding.

 

Oprescu was accused of receiving in September 2015 at his home in Ciolpani, 25,000 euros from his subordinate Bogdan Popa, a former director of the Cemeteries Administration, which the court found were proceeds of corruption.

 

Initially, the court of first instance, the Bucharest Tribunal, sentenced Oprescu in May 2019 to five years and four months in prison, a sentence increased by the Bucharest Court of Appeal to ten years and eight months after the judges found the setting up of the organised criminal group to have been in an aggravated form.

 

Thus, the court convicted Oprescu to 6 years for bribe-taking, 3 years for abuse of office an 3 years and 6 months for money laundering. The sentences were merged in accordance to criminal procedure laws, which mandate the maintaining of the largest sentence and the adding of up to a third of the other sentences totaled, resulting in a 10 year and 8 month conviction.