The cousins Victor and Viorel Topa could escape imprisonment. The two fugitives, who hide in Germany, requested from the Supreme Court of Justice from Chisinau to review their files that condemned them to many years of imprisonment for embezzlement, forgery and money laundering in very big amounts. Victor Topa, who is the godfather of the current Minister of Internal Affairs Andrei Nastase, requested the review of the decision from 2013 of the Supreme Court that maintained the sentence of 10 years in a closed type penitentiary. Victor Topa, together with his accomplice, defrauded through blackmail several people for their bank shares, causing them damages in amount of 31,5 million MDL.
More specifically, one of the shareholders of “Victoriabank”, Galina Prodisvet, was retained in Moscow by two unknown persons and taken to a police station where she was psychological manipulated, threatened with extradition in Moldova where she had to face a criminal file, and threatened with physical violence in her address and in the address of her family, if she did not pass her bank shares to trustful people of Victor Topa. (HERE you can find the decision in Victor Topa’s criminal file in which he was represented by Andrei Nastase as his lawyer. 

According to the documents of the file, Galina Prodisvet was blackmailed in August 2007, in Moscow, with the involvement of some representatives of Russian force bodies. Here is an abstract from the file: “Threatening her and her close relatives with physical violence, they demanded her to accept all the propositions of some people called “Mihail” and “Iurii”, namely the proposition to transfer the rights of the shares she owned in C.B. “Victoriabank” JSC, as well as of the shares owned by V. Turcan and M. Artemenco to the trustful people of Topa Victor. At the same time, G. Prodisvet was forced to phone her sister, V. Turcan, to convince her and M. Artemenco to cede the shares they owned in C.B. “Victoriabank” JSC to a trustful person of V. Topa. The threats of G. Prodisvet, V. Turcan and M. Artemenco had a real character, that is why they accepted to transfer the shares to Topa V. and Morari V. Thus, on 08/03/2007, the defendant Topa V. together with the defendant Morari V., who were staying at the “Pekin” hotel located in Moscow, 5 Bolshaia Sadovaia St, continuing to accomplish their criminal activity to defraud G. Prodisvet and her close relatives V. Turcan and M. Artemenco for the shares they owned at C.B. “Victoriabank” JSC, demanded from the latter ones notarized power of attorneys on the name of Morari V. to give him the power to include the mentioned shares in the asset of some economic individuals and to do all the necessary actions related to this”.
Thus, in the same file, where the current Minister of Internal Affairs Andrei Nastase represented the defendants as lawyer, is shown that through blackmail, Topa V. and Morari V. defrauded people and caused them serious financial damages in amount of 31587488.8 MDL.
At that time was not determined exactly how was possible the involvement of some Russian force structures in the criminal scheme. However, lately are continuing to appear more and more pieces of information about the relations of Andrei Nastase, possibly via his godfather Victor Topa, with force structures from Moscow, but also with criminal groups. 

As for Viorel Topa, he was definitively convicted in 2003 for 8 years of imprisonment in a closed type penitentiary for embezzlement and obliged to pay the equivalent in MDL of 400 thousand USD in the benefit of the Savings Bank of Moldova. According to the conviction sentence decided by the Buiucani Court on 13 January 2012 and maintained by all the superior courts, on 11 December 2000 the Savings Bank of Moldova, led at that time by Viorel Topa, gave a credit of 1 million USD to the “Air Moldova International” Company. At the same time, in order to guarantee the credit repayment obligation, on 30 March 2001, the bank and the offshore company “Sparks Managements Corporation”, led de facto by Viorel Topa, signed a pledge agreement that settled that in case the obligation to pay back the credit is not honored, the 400 thousand USD deposit of the offshore company was to be utilized by the Savings Bank of Moldova for paying the credit, the related interest and penalties, writes Ziarul de Garda.
The conviction decision says that several months later, on 20 August 2001, Viorel Topa, aware of the fact that “Air Moldova International” does not fulfill its agreement obligations, by his own approved the withdrawal of the 400 thousand USD deposit by the offshore company that he managed. On the same day, according to the sentence, the sum was transferred on the deposit account of “Sparks Management Corporation”, opened at the office no. 1 of the Savings Bank of Moldova, on the account of the same offshore opened at a bank in Cyprus. Two days later, Viorel Topa resigned from his capacity as Chairman of the Savings Bank of Moldova.