The Lithuanian Court of Appeals satisfied the appeal of the chief prosecutor of the Vilnius District Prosecutor's Office in the case of political corruption related to "MG Baltic" and found five persons guilty of serious crimes of a corrupt nature of which four are former or current members of the Seimas, as well as three legal entities.
The court took into account the arguments set out in the prosecutor's appeal that the court of first instance, when deciding on the guilt of Raimondas Kurlianskis, Eligijus Masiulis, Vytautas Gapšys, Šarūnas Gustainis, Gintaras Steponavičius, and legal entities, evaluated the evidence separately from each other, did not carry out a balancing exercise in reaching its judgment, made conclusions, did not correspond to the circumstances of the case, and therefore passed an unjustified verdict.
According to the judgment of the Court of Appeal of Lithuania, the former vice president of the concern "MG Baltic" (now - "MG grupė") R. Kurlianskis was found guilty of bribery and trading of influence. The court sentenced him to 6 years of imprisonment and a fine of 18,830 euros. A punitive measure was also imposed - he was deprived of the right to work in managerial positions in the public and private sectors.
The court also found the former member of the Seimas and the former chairman of the political party "Liberalų sąjūdis" E. Masiulis guilty of bribery, influence-peddling, and illegal enrichment. He was sentenced to 5 years and 6 months of imprisonment, 241,490 euros will be confiscated from him. A former member of the Seimas was as well deprived of the right to be elected or appointed to all positions at the state or municipal institutions, companies, or non-governmental organizations for 5 years.
V. Gapšys, a member of the Seimas and the former first deputy chairman of the political party "Darbo partija", was found guilty of bribery and influence peddling. V. Gapšys was sentenced to 4 years and 6 months of imprisonment, 8,000 euros will be recovered for the benefit of the state, as well as a punitive measure was also imposed - the right to be elected or appointed to all positions at the state or municipal institutions, companies, or non-governmental organizations for 5 years.
Former Seimas member Š. Gustainis was found guilty of bribery, a fine was imposed of 18,830 euros, in addition he was deprived of the right to be elected or appointed to all positions at the state or municipal institutions, companies, or non-governmental organizations for 5years and 4,350 euros will be recovered for the benefit of the state.
G. Steponavičius, a former member of the Seimas, was found guilty of abuse, a fine of 5,064 euros was imposed and a punitive measure was applied – he was deprived of the right to be elected or appointed to all positions at the state or municipal institutions, companies or non-governmental organizations for 4 years.
All accused legal entities were also found guilty of crimes of a corrupt nature. The court fined 376,600 euros to the political party “Liberalų sąjūdis” and 301,280 euros to the political party “Darbo partija”. The court also fined 1,129,800 euros to the concern "MG grupė".
A pre-trial investigation into bribery and influence peddling was launched in May 2016. The investigation was conducted by the officers of the Special Investigation Service, it was organized and controlled by the chief prosecutor of the Vilnius District Prosecutor's Office.
The decision of the Court of Appeal enters into force on the day of its publication. This decision can be appealed to the Supreme Court of Lithuania within three months.
