The decision of the supreme court in the case of the two prosecutors from Constanța accused of taking bribes for favorable solutions in cases

The High Court of Cassation and Justice decided on Friday that prosecutors Gigi Valentin Ştefan and Teodor Niță, from the Prosecutor's Office of the Constanța Court of Appeal, remain in preventive detention. The decision is final.

The decision of the supreme court on Friday was pronounced after the two judges from the panel, Anca Barbu and Valerica Voica, did not reach a consensus on Thursday, having different opinions. Both agreed to the pre-trial arrest in the case of prosecutor Gigi Valentin Ștefan, but in the case of prosecutor Niță the judge did not agree to the arrest, according to the ICCJ minutes. Thus, it was necessary to form a divergence committee.

The third judge tipped the balance towards rejecting the appeals of the two defendants and remanding them both.

“Unanimously: Rejects, as unfounded, the appeal filed by the defendant Ştefan Gigi Valentin against decision no. 215 of May 15, 2026, issued by the judge of rights and freedoms of the High Court of Cassation and Justice – Criminal Division, in file no. 947/1/2026. In the majority: Rejects, as unfounded, the appeal filed by defendant Niţă Teodor against decision no. 215 of May 15, 2026, issued by the High Court of Cassation and Justice, in file no. 947/1/2026. It states in the solution published on the ICCJ portal.

The supreme court rejected the appeals the two prosecutors filed against the decision to arrest them. The two prosecutors were detained on May 14 as part of an investigation coordinated by the General Prosecutor's Office, being accused of acts of corruption: influence peddling, bribery, respectively inciting abuse of office.

Why are the two prosecutors accused?

The General Prosecutor's Office shows in the criminal investigation that the two prosecutors had close ties with the political and business environment, intervening in files or with other institutions to obtain favorable solutions for the people in their entourage.

Prosecutor Gigi Valentin Ștefan is accused of having received approximately 60,000 euros in bribes from a person to whom he promised that he would intervene with a prosecutor from a subordinate prosecutor's office and be able to persuade him to settle a criminal case favorably. The prosecutor assured the person who gave him the money that he also had influence over the judges who judged his cases, accuses the General Prosecutor's Office.

Prosecutor Ștefan is also accused of receiving approximately 110,000 euros, goods and other benefits from persons interested in the favorable resolution of some criminal, administrative or professional cases between December 2025 and May 2026.

“In exchange for these benefits, he exerted or promised to exert his influence on public officials, prosecutors, policemen, staff from public institutions or other people with decision-making powers, in order to determine the urgency of some procedures, obtain favorable solutions, interventions in criminal cases, interventions to expedite steps regarding the reacquisition of the driver's license, facilitating professional transfers, issuing opinions and documents or interventions to support businesses and projects economic, including by facilitating some contacts and approaches with civil servants and persons with management positions within some public institutions”, according to the General Prosecutor's Office.

Prosecutor Teodor Niță is accused of trying to influence an officer from the Inspectorate for Emergency Situations of Constanța County not to apply legal measures to a commercial company managed by a person close to the magistrate.

Gigi Valentin Ștefan has 28 years of experience in the prosecutor's office, over the years holding various management positions at the prosecution units in Constanța county, culminating in the position of general prosecutor of the Prosecutor's Office attached to the Court of Appeal (PCA) Constanța in the period 2016-2024. Teodor Niță has been a prosecutor in Constanţa for 19 years, and in 2020 he ran, unsuccessfully, for the headship of DIICOT.

Present in the file of the former CNAS head

The names of the prosecutors Ștefan and Niță were mentioned in the file in which the former head of the National Health Insurance Company (CNAS), Lucian Duță, was tried.

In 2022, judges Daniela Panioglu and Alina Nadia Guluţanu from the Bucharest Court of Appeal indicated in the justification of Duță's conviction that the prosecutors Gigi Valentin Ștefan Teodor Niță harassed key witnesses in the case in which the head of the CNAS was indicted in order to accuse him of escaping the charges.

The two prosecutors rejected the accusations and reported the two judges to the Judicial Inspection.

The CSM decided to exclude judges Panioglu and Guluțanu from the judiciary. The decision was later overturned by the Supreme Court.

In December last year, the supreme court overturned the 6-year prison sentence of the former head of the Health Insurance Company Lucian Duță, in an extraordinary appeal. Duță was accused of taking a bribe of 6.3 million euros in exchange for awarding a contract of public money to two software companies, for the implementation of the health card.

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