Prosecutor Must Make Decision on Complaint Against Original Gorilla Charges(2)

Bratislava, April 17 (TASR) - A prosecutor of the regional prosecutor's office is supposed to make another decision on the complaint against the original charges pressed in the Gorilla case from 2022, as the first deputy of the Prosecutor-General's Office cancelled the February resolution on the termination of the criminal proceedings as well as the March resolution on new charges due to a fact that the law was violated to the benefit of the defendants, according to information provided to TASR by Prosecutor-General's Office spokesperson Zuzana Drobova on Wednesday. Whether or not the charges are substantiated has not been under consideration. Back in February, a prosecutor of the now nonexistent Special Prosecutor's Office (USP) scrapped a decision by which an investigator of the specialised Gorilla team had pressed charges against financier Jaroslav H. [name abbreviated due to legal reasons] and four other individuals in November 2022. The reason was that the investigator also used to serve as a village councillor at the time and the prosecutor was convinced that her mandate as a police officer was thus suspended. Subsequently in March, the prosecutor decided to press new charges against Jaroslav H. and four other individuals in the Gorilla case. According to the Prosecutor-General, however, an individual serving as a village councillor doesn't hold a paid publicly elected post and hence his or her tenure as a member of the Police Corps is not suspended. In 2022, charges of founding, orchestrating and supporting a criminal group were pressed against financier Jaroslav H. and other four individuals. Jaroslav H. was also charged with the aggravated crime of money laundering, together with former head of the National Property Fund Anna B. and ex-economy minister Jirko M. mf/mcs