JUSTICE WIHOUT ITS BLINDFOLD The dilemmas of the settling of scores in the Berbeceanu case

• DILLEMA No. 1: IS IT POTRA IN THE PICTURE OR NOT?

In a photo taken on October 30th, Horaţiu Potra, the head of the Association of the Former Romanian Members of the Foreign Legion (RALF) or someone who looks strikingly like him, appears behind the policemen escorting commissioner Traian Berbeceanu, to the High Court of Cassation and Justice. The photograph was published by many newspapers, without anyone noticing this detail.

Horaţiu Potra was arrested by commissioner Berbeceanu, three years ago, in September 2010, under the charge of illegal possession of firearms and drug trafficking, receiving a conviction with suspension.

The case was presented in a controversial manner in the press. Antena 3 around the arsenal of weapons found at the base of the RALF, where Potra conducts training for bodyguards.

With the exception of an unregistered revolver, it would appear that the weapons were legally owned and with justification, given the nature of the occupation of Potra (he was active for five years in the Foreign Legion, after he was the head of security of some African personalities). For drugs the judges also decided that there was no conclusive evidence.

The most obvious solution would be to think that Horaţiu Potra wanted to witness the humiliation of Berbeceanu, seeing the one who arrested him in handcuffs himself.

But acquaintances of Potra claim that holding grudges is not in his nature, and he is "immune" to it after the dangers he has encountered in his career as a fighter (repeated incarcerations and escapes).

Investigation journalists are whispering that Horaţiu Potra has recently become a partner in the businesses that Frank Timiş has in Africa and that it is possible he wasn't in Romania on October 30th.

This would mean that the person in the photo is not Potra, just someone who looks like him.

At any rate, it is possible that Berbeceanu inconvenienced Potra on other occasions as well.

The famous "Hidra" case, in 2006 (thefts of metal from the Mittal Steel plant in Hunedoara, made with the help of some of the guards), which helped Traian Berbeceanu make a name for himself, as he was later declared "Policeman of the year", had among the main perpetrators K1 fighter Gheorghe Ioniţă, called "Ghiţă the Frenchman", due to his five month stint on the Foreign Legion.

We suspect that Horaţiu Potra and Ghiţă The Frenchman know each other, even though we do not know whether the latter is a member of the RALF association (Potra says that there are approximately 1,500 Romanians who fought in the legion).

Is it Potra or not?

• DILEMMA No. 2: IS BERBECEANU A WHITE KNIGHT OR A LUCIFER?

Beyond the first dilemma, it is a fact that Horaţiu Potra is close to the Romanian Intelligence Service (as a matter of fact, at the time of his arrest in 2010, Potra was in the country, for a course organized by the SRI).

The former head of the Department for Fighting Organized Crime of Alba, Traian Berbeceanu was being tailed by the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI), which tried to accredit the idea that in reality, the spectacular "superpoliceman" career that Berbeceanu had was the result of the fact that he was in cahoots with the criminals and that he was their true leader, by arresting the small fry and never the sharks, by giving them information about the investigations and deciding who would be sacrificed and under what circumstances.

On the other hand, Traian Berbeceanu was waging an open fight with certain officers of the SRI (he tried to arrest, unsuccessfully, the head of SRI for the county of Alba, Ioan Tarnu) and prosecutors of the Department for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism, by officially accusing them of corruption (in his turn) repeatedly, including in the open letter posted on the internet after his arrest, in which he was saying that the structures of the state have been penetrated by criminals (of course, this last statement is nothing but a confirmation of the conviction that we all have within ourselves).

Is Berbeceanu a "Shining Light" of Justice, or is he a "Lucifer" of the corrupt police?

• DILEMMA No. 3: LAURA CODRUŢA KOVESI - ANGEL OR DEMON?

There are rumors that the chief-prosecutor of the National Anti-Corruption Department, Laura Codruţa Kovesi, has negotiated with the Romanian Intelligence Service in favor of Traian Berbeceanu, a commissioner who she worked with in the "Hidra" case, who helped her advance from chief-prosecutor in Sibiu, to general prosecutor of Romania.

The press claims that in 2010, the prosecutors of the National Anticorruption Department (DNA) of Alba had leaked in the local newspapers several recordings of the phone conversations between prosecutor Ioan Lascu, and the former chief-prosecutor of the Prosecutors' Office of the Court of Sibiu, Florin Apostu; in one of them, Apostu was informing Lascu about his intention to secure the support of Lascu's daughter - Laura Codruţa Kovesi, for businessman Ilie Carabulea from Sibiu (involved in several criminal cases) and for his company "Atlassib" (one of the major Romanian transport companies).

A conversation of Kovesi herself was recorded in the office of Apostu, one week before he was arrested for the bribes he accepted from Carabulea, in exchange for dropping the cases he was involved in, conversation which would incriminate her, but the head of the DNA at the time, Daniel Morar, apparently swept everything under the rug.

To make the dilemma even worse, it bears reminding that exactly one week ago, Laura Codruţa Kovesi, in her current position of head of the DNA, has announced the prosecution of a case of tax evasion in the food industry, which involves over a hundred Romanian and foreign companies, with about fifty defendants: Romanian and foreign company managers, lawyers, accountants, and employees of the Ministry of Public Finance.

There are rumors that a senator was ensuring the protection of the entire network of tax evaders.

Is Laura Codruţa Kovesi an "Angel" of the law, or is she its "Demon"?

• DILEMMA No. 4 (AND THE GREATEST ONE): ARE ROMANIANS STEALING FUEL FROM NATO, TOGETHER WITH THE AMERICANS?

Because the charges being brought against Berbeceanu also include favoring tax evasion in the area of fuel sales, some are making an extremely sophisticated connection between his case and the beginning of the works on the American missile shield in Deveselu, in a ceremony (which also happened precisely one week ago) which brought together Traian Basescu and high officials from the Pentagon and NATO.

There are whispers among the investigative journalists, about the stealing of hundreds of tons fuel from the NATO base of Mihail Kogălniceanu, fuel which was then transported to the Western part of Romania, going from one tanker to the next under the coordination of Berbeceanu.

They think that the inauguration of the missile shield in Deveselu will be preceded by audits at the Kogălniceanu base, that the thefts have already been discovered, that the Americans who are to blame will have already been punished and that NATO is now asking us to punish the Romanian accomplices.

Are we stealing fuel hand in hand with the Americans or not?

• MY DILEMMA

I usually know what is going on.

When I say that something is up, then I am convinced that something is indeed up.

It can happen that I am wrong (I can't remember this happening even once, in my 23 years in the press business), but any way, when I say something, I am certain of it.

In the case of Berbeceanu, I have to admit I have no idea.

Nothing is at it seems.

One commissioner without any wealth is accusing the entire system which is supposed to enforce justice and we have no suspicion that what he says is untrue - the individuals involved are orders of magnitude richer than he is.

In a country that is corrupt to the bone, his removal from his position is absolutely to be expected.

But the charges being brought against him are likely too (even though the accusation that he neglected to mention in his assets and wealth statement that he exchanged his car for another is not just ridiculous, but also shows nitpicking in ill faith).

These people are completely missing the point.

It is precisely the people who should be protecting us, ensuring that the law is abided by, that are bringing charges against each other, with dates, recordings, facts.

And almost all of those accusations are likely.

Prime minister Victor Ponta had a historic intervention on Friday, in Sibiu. Speaking about the case of Traian Berbeceanu - the former head of the Department For Fighting Organized Crime of the County of Alba -, he relieved us of our hesitations to criticize the judicial system:

"The judicial system is a good thing if it actually serves justice, not by default. The judicial system is good if it brings justice and I want to make sure, just like the citizens of this country, that in Alba justice is being administered, and we are not merely witnessing a reckoning between institutions", the PM said.

I am saying that the intervention of the prime minister is historic, because, as he is in the habit of lying, this time he may have inadvertently uttered a truth - we may be at precisely that moment where lie and truth overlap.

Until now, whenever a journalist would accuse the judges of foul play, they would get responses like "Who gives you the right to judge before there is a ruling in this case?!", or "We need to have faith in the Romanian legal system!", or maybe even "You are trying to influence the proceedings!".

Well, now, all of us want to make sure that justice gets served in Alba.

And if the prime minister says so, that means that we journalists have that right to comment on the case of Alba, because we are citizens of this country too.

And, considering that on the same day, the investigations in the Berbeceanu case were taken over by the Central Structure of the DIICOT, we understand that we have the right to comment on the national judicial system and to make sure that it serves justice, not just settle quarrels between institutions.

My intimate conviction is that the judicial system does nothing more but settle accounts and does not seek to bring justice.

But, just like Victor Ponta and all the citizens of this country, I would like to make sure that it not the way things work.

I'd be happy if they didn't work like that.

Is there any way I could make sure things aren't like that?