“King of sheep”, detained for a fraud of over 2 million euros. Who else was involved in the scheme

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Dumitru Andreșoi, nicknamed the “King of the Sheep”, was detained on Wednesday evening, October 30, by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, after allegedly defrauding European funds worth over 11.2 million lei. Also, two other heads from APIA were taken to the hearings.

Dumitru Andreșoi, the largest sheep breeder in Romania, Veronica Topor, the deputy director of APIA Hunedoara, and Marius Szabo, head of service within the same institution, were detained for 24 hours. Also, 8 other suspects were picked up and taken to hearings at the EPPO office in Timișoara, informs pressalert.ro.

The scheme that Dumitru Andreșoi would have thought of involved the illegal obtaining of subsidies from European funds. He had employees looking for eligible lands, but at APIA they appeared as leased. So that 85% of the area declared at APIA was not the same as the one in the documents, the source cited above also writes.

In whose name were the documents submitted

Furthermore, the investigation revealed that the documents were not filed in his name, but in his 85-year-old mother’s name.

In the period 2018-2023, there were lease contracts for land in Hunedoara, Arad, Timiș, Harghita, Covasna, Vâlcea, Brașov and Cluj counties. On Thursday, October 31, the culprits risk arrest for 30 days.