The police raided the Brno-Stred District Town Hall on Tuesday, and have since carried out 28 further home searches and questioned 30 people. Photo credit: KK/BrnoDaily.
Brno, Oct 6 (CTK) – A second suspect in the case of corruption related to the allocation of municipal flats in Brno, Civic Democrat (ODS) official Otakar Bradac, was remanded in custody yesterday, following the real estate executive Zdenek Cervinka, while the other six suspects have been released pending further investigations, said prosecutor Petra Lastovecka.
The police raided the Brno-Stred District Town Hall on Tuesday, and have since carried out 28 home searches and questioned 30 people. On Tuesday, they detained eight suspects including Bradac, an influential ODS politician who is an acquaintance of Justice Minister Pavel Blazek (ODS), according to aktualne.cz.
The eight suspects are under investigation for participation in an organised criminal gang, for taking bribes to the benefit of the gang, and for abuse of power, according to details on the website of the prosecutor’s office.
The case relates to suspicious allocation of municipal flats by the Brno-Stred District Town Hall.
Besides Bradac and Cervinka, those under investigation are Radim Suchanek (ANO), who managed flats for the district authorities, his business partner Eva Vagnerova, and also Katerina Pospisilova, Jiri Povolny, Ludvik Kraus and Marek Horvath, all of whom are involved in the real estate market in Brno, according to Czech Television.
PM Petr Fiala’s ODS is the senior coalition partner in both the national government and Brno City Hall, and a member of the Brno-Stred district coalition.
On Tuesday, Monika Lukasova Spilkova, head of the Brno-Stred Town Hall control committee, told CTK that she had highlighted discrepancies in the allocation of flats, as well as suspicious flat swaps and renting, for a long time. Flats were allocated, for example, to the family members and friends of politicians, who jumped the queue ahead of long-waiting applicants, she said.
