Romania

Washington Monthly|Sep 2018|This Shady Consultant Is Paying Guiliani While He’s Also Trump’s Lawyer

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by Mike Lofgren
September 17, 2018

One of the endlessly fascinating things about Washington is that once you start pulling a thread close to one of the town’s gray eminences, there is no telling what you might find.

The press recently reported that Rudy Giuliani is trying to pressure the Romanian government to soften its anti-corruption campaign to benefit a Romanian-American real estate tycoon who was convicted and sentenced to prison. The fact that Giuliani is performing this service while he’s also the White House counsel is troubling enough. But what should have garnered more attention—and so far has not—is that Giuliani is being paid by the Freeh Group, a private consultancy run by former FBI director Louis Freeh.

Freeh’s involvement in this case fits a pattern of his mercenary post-government career. Far more seriously, Freeh was also a lawyer for Prevezon, a money-laundering Russian company caught up in Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Prevezon is also represented by Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who notoriously participated in the infamous June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Russian operatives and Paul Manafort, Donald Trump, Jr., and Jared Kushner to discuss supposed “dirt” on Hillary Clinton.

You may wonder why someone who headed our nation’s counter-intelligence efforts for eight years would be involved with such miscreants. Well, it turns out, working for these kinds of people is almost exclusively what Freeh has been doing since his FBI tenure ended.

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Guardian|Aug 2018|Giuliani says firm defending corrupt Romanian-American is paying him

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Trump’s attorney said he wrote to the Romanian president under a retainer paid by Freeh Group, who represent Gabriel Popoviciu

by Jon Swaine

Donald Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani is being paid to assist lawyers working to free a wealthy Romanian-American real estate magnate who was convicted and sentenced to prison over a corrupt land deal.

Giuliani last week wrote to Romania’s president and prime minister to complain about the nature of their country’s efforts to tackle corruption. He called for an amnesty for people convicted under what he called the “excesses” of the Romanian anticorruption authorities.

The former New York City mayor said on Tuesday that he wrote the letter under a retainer he is paid by Freeh Group, a private consultancy run by Giuliani’s friend Louis Freeh, a former FBI director and federal judge. Giuliani declined to say how much he was paid.

Freeh represents Gabriel “Puiu” Popoviciu, who was convicted in 2016 of crimes relating to his purchase of land in Bucharest that he developed into a shopping mall. The conviction was upheld last year by an appeals court and Popoviciu was sentenced to seven years in prison. After police struggled to find him, he was located in London and arrested.

In a statement last year, Freeh said he had concluded that Popoviciu’s conviction and sentence were “not supported by either the facts or the law” after reviewing the case with a team that included former federal prosecutors.

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Nat’l Law Journal|Aug 2018|Giuliani Says He Had ‘No Intention of Hiding’ Effort to Influence Romanian Government

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by Ryan Lovelace

Rudy Giuliani’s representation of President Donald Trump may have led to his departure from Greenberg Traurig earlier this year, but the former New York City mayor’s close ties to his high-profile client have reportedly led to new business opportunities elsewhere.

Aside from his work defending the president on cable television shows, Giuliani has been looking to influence affairs in Romania at the behest of paying interests.

Giuliani authored a letter to Romanian President Klaus Iohannis last week, first published by Romanian media. In the letter dated Aug. 22, Giuliani wrote to express “concern about the continued damage to the rule of law in Romania, committed under the pretext of law enforcement.” Giuliani’s letter called for amnesty for those who were charged and convicted under the “excesses” of Romania’s National Anticorruption Directorate, especially in light of “secret protocols” involving the Romanian Intelligence Service.

Giuliani told Politico Europe that his letter relied on information provided to him by former FBI director Louis Freeh, and that the latter’s consulting firm, Freeh Group International Solutions, was “paying my fee.”

Giuliani did not say who asked him to offer his opinion to the Romanian president.

Freeh, a former chairman of Pepper Hamilton who cut all ties with the firm in 2016 to return to his consulting outfit, publicly criticized the rule of law in Romania in an interview published Aug. 23 that mirrors Giuliani’s private concerns.

Why Freeh turned to Giuliani for help in Romania remains unclear, and Freeh’s firm did not respond to requests for comment on the matter. But clues may be found in examining Trump’s nominee to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to Romania, Adrian Zuckerman.

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Romania Insider|Aug 2017|Former FBI director defends wanted Romanian investor

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by Irina Marica

Powerful Romanian investor Gabriel Popoviciu, who was sentenced to seven years in prison earlier this month in a fraud and corruption case, has hired former FBI director and former federal judge Louis J. Freeh as a lawyer.

Popoviciu is now wanted by the local authorities. The Police went to his house in Bucharest after the Court ruled the prison sentence, but they haven’t found him there. The businessman is believed to have left the country before the sentence was issued against him, as he had no interdiction in this sense.

Louis J. Freeh defended the Romanian investor in a recent statement, saying that the “sentence and conviction are not supported by either the facts or the law.”

He explained that, last July, he was retained to conduct an independent review of Popoviciu’s conviction before the Romanian Court of Appeals. He conducted the review with the assistance of a team consisting of former federal prosecutors and former FBI Special Agents, one of whom speaks Romanian fluently.

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Times of Israel|Apr 2016|Israelis arrested for spying on Romanian anti-corruption czar

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2 ex-Mossad agents at head of firm also reportedly under investigation for cyber-attacks on state prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi

by Raoul Wootliff

Four Israelis, including two former Mossad agents, are being investigated in Romania for spying on the country’s chief anti-corruption prosecutor, according to a Romanian investigative journalism team.

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Romanian prosecutors accused the Israeli billionaire Beny Steinmetz[*] and several other Israelis of conducting illicit real estate deals that cost the state nearly $150 million.

Judicial sources in Bucharest said they believed Steinmetz, a mining magnate, and Shimon Sheves, the former chief of staff of the late Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, as well as the Israeli political consultant Tal Ziberstein, conspired with Truica to illicitly bring about the transfer of state-held lands to another Romanian citizen, the Romania Libera daily reported in December.

Spokespersons for all three Israelis denied their involvement in illegal actions attributed to Truica, a media tycoon who was arrested in December and incarcerated by the Brasov Court of Appeals pending further investigation.

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[*Steinmetz is a Freeh client]

New York Times|Aug 2018|Giuliani Criticizes an Anticorruption Crackdown in Romania

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By Kit Gillet

BUCHAREST, Romania — Romania, long considered one of the most corrupt states in the European Union, has made energetic efforts to root out graft, with high-profile lawmakers caught in the cross hairs and concerns about the rule of law prompting rallies attended by tens and sometimes hundreds of thousands of protesters.

Now, unexpectedly, Rudolph W. Giuliani, President Trump’s personal attorney, has waded into the debate, sending a letter to Romania’s president, Klaus Iohannis, criticizing the country’s anticorruption efforts.

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Mr. Giuliani said on Wednesday that despite representing Mr. Trump he was “still an independent lawyer and consultant.” He said the work involving Romania was through his security company, Giuliani Security & Safety, which had been retained by Freeh Group International Solutions, a security company run by Louis J. Freeh, a former director of the F.B.I.

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The Freeh Group did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.

Mr. Freeh’s company is known to be representing a Romanian businessman, Gabriel Popoviciu, who was sentenced to seven years in prison in August 2017 in a case centered on a real-estate deal in northern Bucharest.

Criticizing the conviction last year, Mr. Freeh said the decision against Mr. Popoviciu was “not supported by either the facts or the law.”

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