Alexandru Covali, alias Salun, and other members of the group that he created, will remain in prison. In a communiqué, the Prosecutor General’s Office informs that the Supreme Court of Justice on June 20 rejected the appeals of the convicts’ lawyer, whereby he asked quashing the Supreme Court of Justice’s decision of July 15, 2010 and retrying the case. There were invoked violations of the procedural rules, Info-Prim Neo reports. The members of the group led by Alexandru Covali were convicted by a Supreme Court of Justice decision of July 15, 2010. Alexandru Covali was sentenced to 19 years in jail, with the confiscation of property, for trafficking in children for sexual exploitation, procuring, trafficking in persons, illegal keeping of munitions and holding of false important official documents. Tatiana Miron got 18 years for trafficking in children, procuring, and trafficking in persons. The other members of the group - Irina Kaloshina, Victor Turcanu and Veaceslav Palade – were sentenced to five and, respectively, four years in prison for procuring. Marina Covali was given three years’ probation for complicity in procuring. The prosecutors proved that in 2001 – 2006, Alexandru Covali had headed a criminal organization that operated in Moldova, Romania and Ukraine. It directed a large procuring and human trafficking network. The victims were recruited in Moldova, mainly in the Transnistrian region. They were taken to homes in Chisinau municipality, were they provided sexual services. There were identified 24 young women who were involved in the scheme, 11 of whom underage. Two of the girls were from Ukraine.