Citing information from the prosecutor’s office, Mediafax news agency writes: The former football captain is suspected of influence peddling after the Romanian Ministry of Defense (MAPN) entered into a contract with the coach’s son, Alexandru Piturca, for the purchase of 100,000 ffp3 protective masks during the pandemic.
Piturca allegedly persuaded Defense Ministry officials to entrust his son’s company with a €2m buy-out through his ties to the army’s sports club Steaua. According to Romanian media, the procedures in MAPN public procurement started because the protective masks imported from China did not meet current standards and no one used them.
He has already dealt with the authorities
This is not Petorca’s first confrontation with the public prosecutor’s office: in 2013 he was given a one-year suspended sentence for aiding and abetting the corruption trial known as the Money Box case, in which George Becali, owner of Steaua Bucuresti, was sentenced to three years in prison for embezzlement of 1.7 1 million euros in cash. To bribe Universitatea Cluj to steal a point from CFR Cluj and help Steaua reach the main table in the Champions League.
Between 1998 and 2014, Viktor Piturca was the captain of the Romanian national football team in 96 matches in three seasons. And in 2000 and 2008, Romania reached the European Championships under his leadership, MTI reported on what happened.
(Cover photo: Victor Piturca
March 25, 2013. Photo: MTI/EPA/Olaf Kraak)
