PROSECUTORS SUBMITTED TO COURT ANOTHER CRIMINAL CASE AGAINST VEACESLAV PLATON

A criminal case against businessman Veaceslav Platon was submitted to court on Monday.

He is accused of creating an organized criminal gang to conduct a large-scale embezzlement.

According to investigators, Platon was acting in cahoots with two accomplices. During 2016, owning majority packages of shares in three insurance companies via people of straw, he organized the stealing of funds from companies’ accounts. According to the plan, 250 million lei should have been withdrawn from Romanian company’s accounts, it was cut from the main company Moldasig, shareholders and its administration were fictitiously changed for persons who would be controllable by fraudsters. It was supposed that these actions allowed to freely take the money, transferring it on the account of the company, also affiliated by Platon.

In December 2016, at Platon’s order, his accomplices presented a forged protocol of Moldasig Board and other documents, compiled with violations of the legislation, to the head of Moldovan company. However, he disagreed to enter into a deal with them and at the return to Moldova, offenders were arrested by law enforcement.

Prosecutors say that Platon also tried to withdraw money from accounts of Moldasig and Alliance Insurance Group (3.5 million lei and US$10 million) and made an attempt to change deputy heads of these companies for his people.

Infotag’s dossier: On April 10, 2017, Platon was sentenced to 18 years for financial frauds and large-scale money laundering. He was accused of stealing 800 million lei from the bankrupt Banca de Economii.

Veaceslav Platon was detained by Interpol in Kiev on July 25 and on the same day he was extradited to Moldovan authorities, which had declared him internationally wanted. He was brought to Chisinau by a charter flight, which according to Platon’s lawyers, belonged to his former business partner – Democratic Party leader and ruling coalition coordinator Vlad Plahotniuc. Platon is regarded as one of the main coordinators of withdrawing over US$22 billion from Russia through Moldovan banks into offshore accounts within the case called “Landromat”, about which the Russian and international press was writing a lot. He indirectly owns large assets in Moldova’s major banks and insurance companies.