Romanian court releases suspects in eBay fraud

Wednesday, Aug 03, 2011

BUCHAREST, Romania - About 20 Romanians arrested in July and accused of massive fraud on e-commerce sites eBay.com and craigslist.org have been released, a court spokeswoman told AFP Wednesday.

"The court admitted all the appeals" and ordered the release of the suspects on Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the Court of Appeal in Bucharest said, adding that the decision was definitive.

The suspects will continue however to undergo investigations.

The US ambassador to Romania Mark Gitenstein said last month that Washington would seek the extradition of 22 people arrested in the case, in which fraudsters often posed as US military personnel as part of their scheme to dupe victims in all 50 US states.

"Romanian law enforcement authorities conducted 117 searches targeting over 100 suspects," the ambassador told a press conference.

"Twenty-two individuals have been charged in the United States. The United States will seek to extradite these criminals to face criminal charges once they have been processed by the Romanian justice system," he added.

According to Romanian prosecutors, between 2009 and 2011 the suspects duped online buyers into paying out around 20 million dollars for fictitious goods including cars, motorbikes, and electronics on www.eBay.com and on www.craigslist.org.

Money paid by the victims was collected abroad, mainly in the United States and then sent to Romania, they added.

Several cybercrimes networks operating from Romania have been dismantled in recent years, often with the help of US cybercrime experts.