Marian Kočner (source: Sme - Jozef Jakubčo)
The Special Prosecutor’s Office (ŠP) has blocked real estates owned by businessman Marian Kočner across Slovakia, including his villa in the Donovaly resort.
Currently, the businessman is in pre-trial custody, as – according to the Supreme Court – “being free, he could continue criminal activities to keep his position and influence”. Kočner has been charged in three cases, the Sme daily wrote on August 5.
He is suspected of forging €70 million worth of promissory notes involving the private TV Markíza; the former CEO of the TV broadcaster, Pavol Rusko, is also being charged. In addition, Kočner is prosecuted for skulduggery concerning the VAT returns worth €8.3 million during transfers of hotels in Donovaly, and he is charged with the embezzlement of the Gatex company where police calculated the damage at €700,00.
Property seizure
The Prosecutor’s Office blocked the businessman’s possessions as it expects they will be seized within the court proceeding and fears Kočner could avoid this by transferring it to someone else.
TV JOJ was the first medium to draw attention to the seizure of real estates in Donovaly, while Sme discovered this also involves his other properties.
These include, for example, construction plots in Čunovo, a borough of Bratislava, part of which he sold to gain control of the Glance House development in the village of Bernolákovo.
His family house outside the capital has been blocked, too. He bought it from Denisa Páveková, accused of stealing shares of the Technopol Servis company, of which Kočner’s acquaintances siphoned off property worth €20 million.
The Prosecutor’s Office only blocked the property owned by Kočner as a natural entity; they have not touched apartments and plots owned by his companies, for example in downtown Bratislava.
ŠP also blocked properties that have not been mentioned in any of Kočner’s current cases, Sme pointed out, including a plot over five acres in size in the Vinohrady neighbourhood of the capital and the villa in Donovaly that lies next to the villas of ex-minister Ján Počiatek and developer Ladislav Bašternák.
The cadastral office’s data implies that the Special Prosecutor’s Office blocked all real estates with a single order on July 23.
He can file a complaint
As the blocked property is assessed at several million euros in value, it probably relates to the case of allegedly forged promissory notes, or transfers of the hotels in Donovaly. In the Gatex case, damage only amounts to hundreds of thousands of euros, the daily wrote.
TV JOJ reported, citing its own sources, that the blockage is connected to the dubious transfers of Donovaly hotels, which are not actually blocked. The buildings and plots Kočner’s acquaintances have embezzled from the Technopol company have not been blocked, nor has the businessman’s villa in the posh Koliba neighbourhood in Bratislava where he currently lives. Since 1990s, this property has been officially owned by his wife Karolína.
Kočner can file a complaint concerning the block within 30 days, and the special prosecutor will decide on it, Sme summed up.
