55-year-old man from Covasna county, detained by Buzau police for manslaughter and three other crimes

A 55-year-old man from Covasna county was detained by the police from Buzau county on Thursday. He is accused of manslaughter, failure to take legal safety and security measures, forgery and instigation of forgery. As an administrator of a company, he did not signal a work site as required by law, the police say, and a 36-year-old man, also from Covasna county, died.

The works that the company of the 55-year-old Covas resident was doing were in the field of forest exploitation.

“From the investigations, it emerged that, on August 8, 2023, as an administrator of a forestry company, he would have improperly coordinated the authorized works, in a prosecutor’s office in the outskirts of the Gura Teghii commune, in the sense that measures would not have been taken to demarcate and signal the place where logging was carried out”, the Buzău County Police Inspectorate (IPJ) reported.

During the work, a tree fell on a 36-year-old man.

“In this context, through the improper handling of an excavator by another employee, on the instructions of the 55-year-old man, he allegedly felled a tree. In falling, the tree allegedly surprised and fatally injured a 36-year-old man from Covasna”, according to the police.

The investigation showed that the operator of the excavator was not employed and “would not have had the qualification nor the mandatory specific training in terms of occupational health and safety”.

The 55-year-old man from Covasna County later tried to hide the fact that he did not have an employment contract.

“Subsequently, the investigated man would have determined a 25-year-old man from Covasna to retroactively draw up the individual employment contract and a health and safety training sheet in the name of the person who would have handled the exploitation equipment. The documents would have been backdated, in order to create the appearance that the man was employed on the date of the incident”, IPJ Buzău also transmitted.

The 55-year-old man is to be brought before the court on Friday with a proposal for preventive arrest (for 30 days).

The 25-year-old, who tried to help the man by drawing up the documents retroactively, is being investigated under judicial control.