AUBURN — Prosecutors are seeking to revoke the bail of a Romanian dissident charged with assaulting his wife.

A hearing on the motion was postponed Wednesday after the defendant asked an Androscoggin County Superior Court judge to allow medical experts to testify.

Leonard Oprea, 55, of 81 Briarcliff Knoll was ordered by a judge in June to be committed to Riverview Psychiatric Hospital for psychological observation and evaluation. His attorney, Donald Hornblower, filed the motion for commitment after meeting with his client in jail.

The motion by prosecutors to revoke Oprea’s $1,200 cash bail stems from an e-mail Oprea reportedly sent from the hospital on July 27 to dozens of friends and acquaintances in which he refers to his relationship with his wife and daughter and his alleged crimes. Included in the list of recipients were co-workers of Oprea’s wife, Assistant District Attorney Nicholas Worden wrote in his motion.

Oprea’s e-mail violates a protective order between him and his wife, Worden wrote. Oprea also violated his conditions of bail that forbid direct or indirect contact with his wife and daughter.

Oprea’s wife, Brigitte Hristea, told police she is “petrified and fears
for her life and her daughter’s life,” Worden wrote in his motion. 

Worden said Wednesday he didn’t know how Oprea managed to access the Internet at the hospital to send his e-mail message.

In his long, rambling e-mail message, Oprea wrote: “After I will be free form this Hell, I intend to go very quickly to God, just because I do NOT can and I do NOT want to live without my family,” according to court papers.

He also wrote: “Today, America and my family and some ‘good’ friends — happly (sic) behead me. May the Lord forgive them all. Or, may the Lord judge them.”

He is being held without bail until after his bail hearing, a court clerk said Wednesday.  

Oprea was arrested in May and charged with domestic violence assault, domestic violence criminal threatening and obstructing report of a crime. Each charge is punishable by up to 364 days in jail.

He is described by online sources as an anti-communist dissident in Romania during the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu in the 1980s. He published a book and several short stories that won national literary prizes. The secret police of the Communist regime officially blocked the publication of his writings in 1987, calling them subversive.

Two years after the Romanian Revolution of 1989, he became a well-known Romanian writer, journalist and editor, according to Web sources.

He has been living in the United States since 1999.

An Androscoggin County Superior Court judge last month ordered that a lien be placed against the home Oprea lived in with his wife to reimburse the state for his attorney fees.

Because Oprea has been incarcerated and is involved in divorce proceedings, the judge said he may not have access to money. “Nevertheless, it is necessary for the defendant to have the advice and assistance of counsel,” Justice Thomas Delahanty II wrote in his July 14 order. He wrote that Oprea’s court-appointed attorney should continue to represent him and that the state should put a $2,500 lien against Oprea’s real estate and “credits at any financial institution” in the state. The order can be changed if the actual amount is more or less than the amount of the lien.

The court’s financial screening officer discovered that Oprea is owner or co-owner of property in Auburn valued at $400,000 or more. 

cwilliams@sunjournal.com

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