Former Romanian MEP Adrian Severin was found guilty of bribery and influence peddling and sentenced yesterday to four years in prison. The High Court’s sentence is final and Severin will be incarcerated.

Romania’s National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) started Severin’s prosecution in September 2013, to years after fake lobbyists tricked him into accepting a EUR 100,000 in exchange for influencing EU legislation. The two lobbyists were in fact journalists from the British tabloid “The Sunday Times”, who exposed Severin and two other members of the European Parliament. While the other two MEP resigned immediately Severin kept his seat, but the European Parliament lifted his immunity.

Former Austrian MEP Ernst Strasser, who was also exposed by the Sunday Times investigation, was sentenced to 3 years in jail by a court in Vienna, in March 2014. Slovenian Zoran Thaler, the third MEP involved in the scandal, was also convicted to 2 and a half years in prison by a Ljubljana court, in February 2014.

Meanwhile, Adrian Severin has always claimed that his prosecution by Romania's anticorruption directorate was politically motivated. After the Court ruled the final sentence on him, he wrote on Facebook that “the comedy is over”. “As I was expected, what started as a journalistic farce ended with a judicial farce. This hasn’t been a fight between honesty and corruption, but a fight between the country and its enemies. In a colony, there is no rule of law,” he added, hinting that the case against him has been driven by foreign interests.

Severin was initially sentenced to three years and three months in jail, in February this year, but the DNA challenged the court’s decision and asked for the penalty to be doubled. A panel of five judges admitted DNA’s appeal and increased the sentence against the former MEP.

His lawyers asked for his acquittal, or a probation sentence. In the final court hearing, Severin said that he was “the best OSCE president”, and “the poorest politician in Romania”. He added that he could have settled for a guilt admission deal that would have brought him a probation sentence, but that he couldn’t do that after serving the country for 25 years. “I can’t admit that Romania has sent a thief in such important offices,” he said, according to local Agerpres.

editor@romania-insider.com

(Photo source: Adrian Severin on Facebook)