The pro-Russian oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc has been sentenced by the judges of the Chișinău Court to 19 years in prison in the case of embezzling one billion dollars.
Vladimir Plahotniuc is accused of fraud, money laundering, creating and leading a criminal organization.
The verdict is not final and can be appealed, as reported by Radio Chișinău.
Vladimir Plahotniuc has been in pre-trial detention since September 25, 2025, after being extradited from Greece, when the four arrest warrants issued in his name were executed, according to MOLDPRES.
A former parliamentarian and founder of the Democratic Party, Plahotniuc is accused of secretly controlling key institutions in the Republic of Moldova: He fled the country in 2019, at a time when he was being investigated in multiple cases.
He is particularly accused for his role in a massive corruption scandal involving the disappearance of one billion dollars from the treasury of three national banks.
Other ongoing investigations
Plahotniuc is also a suspect in three other cases still under investigation:
- a case related to the "fraudulent acquisition of passport blanks" - between 2019-2020, the Public Services Agency allegedly paid a foreign company "royalty" fees for each issued document, causing a damage of around 140 million lei;
- a case regarding the alleged bribery of the then-president, Igor Dodon, with an amount between 600,000 and one million dollars, in the context of the "kuliok" case;
- the "Metalferos" case, where it is claimed that Plahotniuc led a criminal organization involved in large-scale fraud and money laundering.
