Raider attacks explained simply

The case of Viorel Topa and Victor Topa, in simple words

Imagine you are a law-abiding citizen living in Moldova. You come from a respectable family, graduated from good universities, pursued a diligent career. All your life you prove to be a decent person, who respects the law and the duties, pays taxes, honestly earns and reinvests your savings.

One day you wake up and find out that your properties have been transferred to some unknown people or offshores. You then figure out that the robbery is based on some “court decisions” about which you have no idea. After the shock, you try to investigate. Then you are threatened with fabricated criminal cases against you and your family members. You must shut your mouth and keep quiet, but you continue to fight for your rights. You are sentenced to many years of imprisonment in a penitentiary with closed regime, so that you can’t talk to the outer world. In sham “trials”, with false allegations, in the absence of you and your lawyers, with no chance to defend yourself.

You then realise that you’ve been a victim of a “raider attack” – a conspiracy carried out by the country’s highest ranking prosecutors and judges in order to rob you. You also come to realise that the gang is led by a mighty commander, the beneficiary of the attacks’ spoils. And this is Vladimir Plahotniuc, who became the wealthiest man of Moldova by means of raider attacks. The country’s judiciary and law-enforcing agencies are under his absolute and undivided control.

Later you understand that you are among hundreds of others, stripped of their assets by the same methods and by the same gang. You also realise that you confront the heads of the Prosecutor General’s Office, the National Anticorruption Centre, the judiciary (including the Supreme Court of Justice), the Ministry of Justice; and that all your previous complaints were naively submitted to these very perpetrators. It made them giggle. From victim of robbery they turned you into a criminal and there is no higher instance to challenge their arbitrariness.

Since the heads of law-enforcing institutions have become aware of their power and impunity, they have banded together into an overwhelming plunder and condemnation machine. A rather lucrative one, hence their luxury villas, cars, bank accounts, private jets and other derivatives of their “business”.

Luckily, you escape the arrest, having fled the country just few hours before getting caught. It turns out that the others weren’t so lucky – some were jailed, some gave in in order to protect their families, some were killed in prison like Magnitsky in Russia. Since you keep fighting for your rights from abroad, the same gang, who call themselves “official authorities”, are continuously sending extradition requests and demanding Interpol’s arrest notices. They want you annihilated or at least trapped in ceaseless, costly, exhausting proceedings.

Further, you submit your case to the human rights organisations, but all of them prefer to be busy saving penguins in Antarctica only not to irritate the country's almighty gang. The clerks of those organisations know how callous the backfire can be, while they also have families and relatives. They are not looking for trouble.

To ensure their bureaucratic comfort, also the EU and US representatives turn the blind eye on the outrages, even though their reaction would not expose them to any personal risk. In private, they acknowledge their awareness of the hijacked state institutions and the retaliation campaign being carried out against you, and even sympathise with you. However, in public, they diplomatically support and congratulate your executioners for some imaginary successes.

You feel let down, marooned, far from your home, livelihood and sources of existence. For even harsher punitive effects, your family house is seized and your bank savings are stolen. The Internet is full of references of your condemnations and “criminal deeds” which you never committed. Everybody who can google your name avoids you. So do officials, albeit they are those you have relied on and expected to intervene. You did nothing to get into such a situation. They did nothing not to be in your place.

Finally, you ascertain that „human rights” and the „rule of law” are catchy subjects for officials’ discourses, but when it comes to a specific case, the proponents dodge. The bureaucrats instinctively hide themselves at that very moment when the blatant violation occurs and their reaction is badly required.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”, Edmund Burke, XVII^th century.

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”, Elie Wiesel, XX^th century.

In the above, you have read the story of two investors, Viorel Topa and Victor Topa, from 2010 to these days.

Viorel Topa

Victor Topa

As mentioned above, from the very day Viorel Topa and Victor Topa left Moldova, the entire state apparatus sought their arrest and extradition. The table below shows the requests and responses to the Moldovan authorities:

Nov 2011	Victor Topa, Viorel Topa, Razvan Paveliu and Vladimir Morari escape the arrest and imprisonment in Moldova and flee to Germany:
5 Dec 2011	German Federal Department of Justice to General Prosecution Office, objection to search and extradite Victor Topa;
14 Dec 2011	General Prosecution Office to German Federal Criminal Bureau, objection of extradition of Victor Topa and his lawyer, Vladimir Morari, expressed in unanimity by the German Federal Department of Justice and Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs;
May 2013	Interpol’s 86th session, the cases of Viorel Topa and Victor Topa determined as being of political nature, Red Notice requests of the Moldovan authorities rejected;
18 Dec 2015	Repetitive Red Notice requests of the Moldovan authorities of 24 November 2015 concerning Viorel Topa and Victor Topa repeatedly rejected. This decision is final;
20 Oct 2015	Verbal Note of German Federal Foreign Office to the Embassy of the Republic of Moldova, extradition of Victor Topa and Vladimir Morari rejected, breach of rule of law among the grounds. This decision is final;
17 Nov 2015	Verbal Note of German Federal Foreign Office to the Embassy of the Republic of Moldova, extradition of Viorel Topa rejected, breach of rule of law among the grounds;
11 Jan 2016	Hessian Ministry of Justice to Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office in Frankfurt, within “Assistance for extradition and execution of sentence with the Republic of Moldova”, execution of sentence concerning Victor Topa, Vladimir Morari and Viorel Topa rejected;
10 Feb 2016 21 Apr 2016	Public Prosecutor’s Office Frankfurt reviews of a new request of Moldovan authorities concerning the transfer the prosecution proceedings against Victor Topa, Vladimir Morari and Viorel Topa;
28 Apr 2016	Public Prosecutor’s Office Hessen, confirmation that extradition requests from 2011-2012 of Moldovan authorities against Viorel Topa are rejected, file closed/dismissed;
21 Mar 2017	Interpol’s 99th session, new repetitive Red Notice request of the Moldovan authorities concerning Viorel Topa is rejected as “matter of a predominantly political character” (politically motivated reprisals);
13 Jun 2017	Public Prosecutor’s Office Frankfurt, action against Viorel Topa, Victor Topa and Vladimir Morari rejected, file closed/dismissed;
23 Jan 2018	The appeal against the previous decision of the Public Prosecutor’s Office Frankfurt is rejected. This is decision is final and no longer challengeable;
3 May 2018	The challenge of the final decision of the Public Prosecutor’s Office Frankfurt to reject actions against Viorel Topa, Victor Topa and Vladimir Morari are dismissed by the Frankfurt Court (Oberlandesgericht Frankfurt am Main). This decision is final and no longer challengeable.
Remark:	This table does not include requests which were rejected without examination, nor does it include repetitive requests from Moldova to the German authorities.