A court sentenced former Health Minister Sorina Pintea on Friday to three and a half years in prison on a 35,000-euro bribery charge.
The ruling is not final and she can appeal. The court also ruled to bar Dr. Pintea from holding public office or the position of manager of a public hospital for three years.
Magistrates ordered 10,000 euros be confiscated from her in connection with the case. She has ten days to appeal.
Dr Pintea was sent to trial in April 2020 by anti-corruption prosecutors for repeated bribes after she was caught red-handed taking a bribe
According to the indictment, when she was manager of Baia Mare County Emergency Hospital, Dr. Pintea allegedly demanded and received, through an intermediary, 10,000 euros in Dec. 2019 and 120,000 lei in Feb. 2020 from a company in exchange for awarding a contract.
The money represented 7% of the value of a public procurement contract for the “design and execution of works for the operating theater – cardiovascular and thoracic surgery room and adjacent spaces in the County Emergency Hospital. The contract was signed in 2019.
Dr. Pintea, a Social Democrat, held the post of health minister from January 2018 to October 2019.
Dr. Pintea was detained on February 29 2020 after a sting operation. Prosecutors allegedly caught her as she took 120,000 lei in her office.
Amid reports that she suffered from ill health, she was released from detention after a week and restrictions were placed on her movements during the probe.
She resigned as manager in March 2020, but a month later said she had had a change of heart and intended to keep her old job. Health Minister Nelu Tataru then fired her on April 10.
In 2019, she was accused of intimidating a non-governmental organization that raised 26 million euros for a pediatric cancer hospital. She said the funds that were raised over four years should be handed to the state.
As minister, she sent a team of undercover detectives to Romanian hospitals to check out whether medics and nurses were demanding or accepting bribes, something which is still commonplace in Romania.
Romanian ex-health minister detained on suspicion of taking “repeated bribes”
