The Specialised Criminal Court sentenced the judge of the Topoľčany District Court, Vlastimil V., to five years in prison for accepting a bribe and abusing the power of a public official. Moreover, he was fined €2000 and banned from serving as a judge for five an additional years.
The Sme daily in its Tuesday, June 18 issue quoted the verdict, according to which the judge accepted two bribes amounting to 20,000 Slovak crowns (approximately €660), back in 2005.
In this case, the prosecutor of the Special Prosecutor’s Office also charged a lawyer, Jaroslav V., and businessman Miroslav S., for offering a bribe amounting to €331 to the judge. They were found guilty of the crime of bribing a public official and they both received conditional sentences of 18 months, the SITA newswire wrote. Another bribe was allegedly given to the judge by Lýdia Š., who wanted her imprisoned son to be transferred to a different prison. The verdict is not effective yet, as the defendants have appealed it.
(Source: Sme, SITA)
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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