Florin Secureanu: Love in the time of criminal perseverance
Whoever says that romance is dead has yet to meet Florin Secureanu. Our hero managed to make his love (and life) flourish in the most unlikely circumstances through sheer financial inventiveness, and to nurture his prosperity despite massive nuisances such as laws, good business practices or the health of Romanians. In case you’re curious, here is his recipe.
Now the former manager of the Malaxa Clinical Hospital in Bucharest, Florin Secureanu coordinated the hospital between 2007 and November 2016, when he was sacked by the Bucharest City Hall — the public authority that appoints the personnel of the institution. According to the National Anticorruption Agency (DNA), “between May 2009 and November 2016, the suspect devised and applied a plan through which he extracted amounts of money from the hospital’s cash desk repeatedly (almost daily). Based on the evidence on file, invoices were issued for a number of 1.075 days, which means that on 1.075 days the suspect appropriated for himself sums of money from the hospital’s patrimony.”
In his seven years in the role, Secureanu used the hospital’s money to buy various essential items for his lover, family and entourage: jewellery, gifts, trips, pianos, a limousine, and slimming operations, to name but a few. He stands accused of repeated embezzlement (1075 times) and repeated bribe-taking (470 times), alongside other employees and directors at the hospital, as well as business owners who used their firms to pay for the manager’s lavish lifestyle. The damages exceed 9,1 million lei (1.79 million GBP).
Enter “Little Sparrow”
Secureanu used some of the illicit proceeds to kick off a romance with his 24-year-old lover by setting up a collaboration with a jewellery store in Bucharest. The store delivered various pieces to Secureanu, including a ring for his lover, Cristina Eugenia Chiriac, nicknamed “Little Sparrow”. To cater to her glamorous tastes, Secureanu had a special ring made for her. It was the replica of a ring worn by one of the characters in the Turkish soap opera Suleyman the Magnificent, a hugely popular TV series in Romania. In exchange for its work, the jewellery store was asked to issue invoices for the sterilisation of medical equipment from the Malaxa Hospital’s Gynaecology Ward. (The services were, in fact, delivered. The owner of the store mentioned that her husband had been cleaning the equipment in their house.)
As any lover knows, bling must be accompanied by flowers, which is why our Don Juan also bought flowers and gift baskets worth 545,000 lei (107,000 GBP) from a flower shop called Borealy Gifts. The items were delivered both at the hospital and at Secureanu’s house for special occasions such as Easter, Christmas or Women’s Day. Borealy Gifts also bought other kinds of goods that Secureanu requested in order to keep renewing the contract. Wine, coffee, sweets, or fountain pens were lavished on him disguised on paper as “IT services”.
Sweeping anybody off their feet is inevitable if you carry on such work in a warm and exotic place. Another company, Noventis International, a tourism agency, offered Secureanu 754 tourism services (accommodation, meals, plane tickets, etc.) for himself, his friends, family members, doctors and other Malaxa employees, for a grand total of 1,2 million lei (240,000 GBP). This is how he, Little Sparrow and their entourage managed to visit tens of destinations all around the world. In exchange for its services, Noventis also issued bogus invoices, this time for medical supplies (syringes, surgery sets, robes, gloves, etc.).
Finally, to also keep things sweet for his accomplices, yet another company bought over 200 presents of 20,000 lei (4,000 GBP) for the hospital’s employees. Several managers played a critical role in drawing up the fake financials documents needed to justify the unduly spent money. The others were simply cut off from the truth. This seems to have happened to Victor Diaconu, the manager of the surgery ward at Malaxa and the doctor who performed weight loss surgery on Secureanu’s niece. Months later, he noticed that his signature had been forged on the documents that approved the purchase of the tools used for that procedure.
Star-crossed lovers
Any love story as great as the one written by Secureanu inevitably ends in tragedy. Secureanu was separated from his beloved in 2016, when he was arrested and kept under protective custody after the judge refused to grant him house arrest. The judge invoked “the ease and criminal determination”, and the high amounts of money stolen by the defendant to argue that he was a threat to public order. It also didn’t help that Secureanu lied to the judge, saying that because of his imprisonment his two underage children were living with strangers. They were actually cared for by their mother, Secureanu’s former wife.
Secureanu played the pity card to the end. “I would like to let you know that I regret and admit to the facts that I am accused of. At my last meeting with the prosecutors, I admitted to absolutely all the accusations. I wanted my confession to take place after the criminal expertise was over. I admitted to absolutely everything that I’ve been made aware of, and these are all acts that I regret. My health issues have worsened, I have lung problems, and my arrest interferes with my doctor’s appointments, which is why the treatment that I was supposed to receive was delayed. I have a dental work that is left unfinished, which could cause septicaemia”. His plea did not sway the court. In April 2017, the Bucharest tribunal extended Secureanu’s protective custody and impounded several of his properties.
They say love is all fun and games until somebody gets hurt. Too bad that in this case there’s nothing abstract about the damages. The delusions of grandeur of one man placed in a position of power wrecked the lives of hundreds of Romanians who were or could have been treated at one of the main hospitals in Bucharest.
