Bizarre law: Romanian criminals who want a shorter jail sentence do it by the book

Dan Voiculescu , one of Romania’s richest men and owner of several television stations, was sentenced to 10 years in prison in August 2014 for corruption. Since then, he has reportedly written eight scientific papers – a startling achievement by any standards.

Impressive though it may be, there are suspicions his productivity may not be motivated by academic zeal alone.

Under a bizarre Romanian law, prisoners can shave 30 days off their jail terms for every book of scientific value that they author – and it is an opportunity being seized by many white-collar prisoners in a country engaged in an unprecedented crackdown on corruption.

While in prison for graft offences, politicians and businessmen in particular are churning out papers in order to take advantage of the loophole, with little in the way of checks to confirm the value or even originality of the works produced.

“The law has been like this for many years but we haven’t seen such abuses until recently,” said Laura ȘStefan , an anti-corruption expert and a former director in the Romanian ministry of justice. “It has come at a time when Romania’s anti-corruption push has started to generate convictions.”

According to the country’s prison administration, 415 scientific works written by prisoners were published between the start of 2013 and December 9, 2015. In 2012, there were just seven.