Dragnea's "fixer" in the judiciary system and at the Constitutional Court

The appointment of an opportunist judge and of an obedient prosecutor at the Constitutional Court secures a PSD controlled majority in one of the most important institutions of the Romanian state.

However, it would be illusory to expect 9 years of loyalty, given the doubtful quality, human and otherwise, of the appointees. Just as Petre Lăzăroiu, appointed by Traian Băsescu for a partial mandate, has come to play politically with PSD after the former Cotroceni president left, someone as Judge Cristian Deliorga is expected to act in the same fashion if the great party that supported him loses the elections at one point.

I remember Deliorga well in his position of SCM deputy chairman in 2006 – perceived then as a prolongation of the Stănoiu-Lupaşcu era in the courts – as he tried to somehow ingratiate himself with the new powers that be. Bearing an anti-reformist agenda, Deliorga comes from the world of ordinary magistrates to get his guidance from the party before deciding upon a solution.

However, Deliorga is known in the system largely because of his friendship with Adina Florea, the deputy chief of the Special section for Investigating Crimes Committed by Magistrates. PSD recruited from this section a magistrate to be sent to the Constitutional Court: Gheorghe Stan, the former president of the department.

Stan has been a good performer ever since the era when he was chasing inconvenient magistrates from his position of Deputy of the Judicial Inspectorate head, along with Lucian Netejoru. His unswerving obedience recommended him as head of the Special Section, where he fully confirmed the politicians’ expectations.

Under the leadership of Stan and Florea, the Special Section has opened a chain of judicial files against DNA chief Laura Codruta Kovesi in order to prevent her from becoming the head of the European Prosecutor’s Office.

Today Stan exhibited very poor training, which is why PSD raised a protective wall around him, censoring almost all the questions posed by the opposition during the Chamber of Deputies’ hearings.

The precariousness of his legal thinking could not be hidden, however, when the future constitutional judge presented his strengths and vision: „The activity within the Prosecutor’s Office, but also within the Ministry of Justice, is an advantage. If I were elected a CCR judge, I would be interested in respecting the supremacy of the Constitution. ” Abysmal.

Who then, extracts all those dubious magistrates out from a hat? How have mediocrities become so important in the judiciary system? In the Special Section case, the person who led the interviews in the selection procedure held at the SCM was the Council’s President Lia Savonea.

Stan and Florea seem to be, therefore, her creation. Lia Savonea is considered by many as PSD’s leader « fixer » in court. The Justice Initiative Association made a detailed inventory of her abuses as the head of the SCM and demanded the revocation of her presidency.

Finally, Judge Deliorga’s and Lia Savonea’s friendship is notorious in the system.

Therefore, it would not be impossible for this recommendation to come also from the SCM chairman’s pipeline, as she is an ambitious magistrate, thirsty for of power, dreaming of leading the High Court of Cassation and Justice one day.

Thanks to her dangerous rapprochement with the PSD leader, Savonea holds the keys to the judiciary. Savonea’s SCM judges section has already appointed all the Heads of the High Court sectors and will appoint the President of the High Court. She therefore controls entire areas of key state institutions.

A former head of the Bucharest Court of Appeal, she has long kept a low profile. She is the wife of lawyer Mihai Savonea, former colleague of the famous former PSD senator, Cătălin Voicu, convicted in two criminal cases.

Perhaps not accidentally, Cristian Deliorga, asked how he came to submit his candidacy to the Senate PSD group, explained that he was acquainted with Senator Serban Nicolae. The latter distinguished himself by being a driver to Cătălin Voicu, a criminal convict.

In just two years, the judiciary system has regressed to its station in the 2000s, the sinister Năstase-Stănoiu era, when prosecutors did not have the courage to investigate politicians, nor judges to judge them, and the solutions in the important files came in an envelope from the party through the magistrates-politicians pipeline.

Traducerea: Ruxandra Stoicescu