Yes, it can be. One fresh case.

Emilia Șercan is an investigative journalist (for 22 years) working as an assistant professor (for 7 years) at University of Bucharest, Faculty of Journalism and Communication Sciences, Department of Journalism. First time I communicated with her in Brno at the conference Plagiarism across Europe and Beyond 2017. There I learnt about the spectrum of her activities and the power of her personality. She is fearless, steady and unceasing fighter against academic misconduct[1] in Romania.

On factual basis she has held the mirror up to high-ranking government and public sector officials in the matter of their academic misconduct. She mercilessly uncovers plagiarism, corruption, nepotism and other ills in the higher education sector. Her tireless effort has brought positive changes in the real life of academic sector.

“The problem in Romania is that people in all important leadership positions, in all institutions, parties, secret services, administration and even in the academia have plagiarised Ph.D.’s. No one wants a real change. You can’t imagine how hard the battle is here and what kind of obstacles they try to find just not to change things and not to be in position to pay for this,” said E. Șercan.

She points out the plagiarism of high-ranking public, political, military and security services officials in her book FABRICA DE DOCTORATE sau Cum se surpa fundamentele unei natii (2017, ISBN 978-973-50-5776-3, 210 pages); in English: DOCTORAL FACTORY or How to Destroy Fundamentals of a Nation.

For the past 4 years, she has been constantly publishing investigations on plagiarised theses defended both in military and civil universities. The list of people who have plagiarised their Ph.D. theses, according to her research, includes the deputy prime-minister, two ministers of Internal Affairs, a Defence minister, an Education minister, a Health minister, the first deputy-in-chief to the Romanian Prosecutor General, the chief of the Judicial Inspection, politicians, judges, rectors, secret service generals and the police quaestor. The details, concrete names and positions of her investigations are documented here.

She has constantly been a target for intimidation and denigration campaigns, however, she has continued to do her job with respect for the truth, serving solely public interest. The death threat that she received on the evening of 15 April by a SMS message represents yet another attempt to hinder her disclosures.

 „We are sending this message with the purpose of preventing what will follow, it all depends on you. Stop all actions that you are currently undertaking… if you don’t want ordeal to follow (…)[2]. ”

The Romanian police was notified about this. The man who sent the death threats to Emilia Șercan was found on 24 April – he is a police officer, employed by the Police Academy, about which she wrote and had an extensive series of investigations underway. 

The case was transferred on 25 April from the District 4th Attorney Office and the Bucharest Police Office to the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA), which is competent to investigate cases involving police officers who have committed certain offenses. DNA is a special unit within the Attorney General Office, specialized in corruption cases. The police officer who threatened her admitted that he was the one who sent her that message, but he said to the prosecutor that it was not his own initiative and he did it because he was asked by the Rector of the Police Academy, who is a police questor and full professor and PhD supervisor (this rank is equivalent to the general in the army), with whom he had a special relationship. The Rector of the Police Academy, Adrian Iacob, devised the threats along with the Deputy Rector, Mihail Petrica Marcoci, who was associate professor, police chief-commissioner and the spokesperson of the Police Academy. 

On 25 March, E. Șercan revealed that Adrian Iacob, the Rector of the Police Academy, plagiarised more than 70% of his PhD thesis. According to the Romanian law, if a PhD degree is withdrawn for plagiarism, that person can’t be a professor anymore – so Iacob may lose his entire academic career because of her revelations. The police officer who threatened her was not arrested, he was placed under judicial control. The Rector and the Deputy Rector of the Police Academy had been indicted by prosecutors on charges of „instigation to blackmail“ and they have resign. Both are placed under judicial control.

Sources:

• https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/doctorates-factory-sos-from-romania-julius-kravjar/
• https://cpj.org/2019/04/romanian-investigative-journalist-emilia-sercan-re.php

Șercan, E., Personal communication

• Glossary for Academic Integrity
• https://pressone.ro/rectorul-academiei-de-politie-a-plagiat-peste-doua-treimi-din-teza-sa-de-doctorat/
• https://www.rappler.com/world/regions/europe/231484-romania-police-academy-chiefs-quit-after-threatening-reporter?fbclid=IwAR0hxqhoGkbW4krpW04aJWES9Kacqrna1NVA4Oxq5NEsCZcQA2dY5eGdBzo

The earlier version of this article previously appeared in the Newsletter of European Network for Academic Integrity

Notes:
[1] Any action or attempted action that undermines academic integrity and may result in an unfair academic advantage or disadvantage for any member of the academic community or wider society
[2] A part of the threat message was censored by Șercan, who wanted to protect her family.

By Július Kravjar
Member of the board of European Network for Academic Integrity