30 minutes before they found themselves in Bankya, the police did not know who they would search “as a matter of urgency”
The defender assists the uniformed men to take the ex-prime minister out of his home on a route to avoid clashes with angry supporters.
Order after order by phone and touring between the police, the prosecution, the court and again the police
According to the lawyer, which Bulgarian laws have been violated?
What happened on Thursday, March 17, when Boyko Borissov was detained at his home due to “urgency”? “24 Chasa” asked the lawyer of the former Prime Minister Menko Menkov to describe the chronology and he provided us with his notes. See them with abbreviations.
On December 10, 2021, the civil association BOEC sent a signal to the Minister of Interior Boyko Rashkov. (Editor’s note: it describes allegations by businessman Vasil Bozhkov, owner of the National Lottery, that he was blackmailed. )
The report contains excerpts from media publications. Boyko Rashkov sends the signal for inspection to the GDNP. Boyko Borisov, Sevdelina Arnaudova and Vladislav Goranov appeared before the inspectors on different days in December 2021 and submitted explanations of the questions asked.
On March 17, 2022, at about 11.30 am, the Prime Minister Mr. Kiril Petkov gathered in his office in the Council of Ministers the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Mr. Asen Vassilev, the Minister of Interior Mr. Boyko Rashkov and police officers from GDNP.
At the several-hour meeting, Mr. Kiril Petkov requested full information about the data collected by the police inspectors in the file. He begins to give them instructions and demand action. To date, the materials in the file have not been reported to the prosecutor’s office, as required by law.
Mr. Kiril Petkov offered to be questioned as a witness. So far no pre-trial proceedings have been instituted and according to Bulgarian law, all materials collected in the course of the preliminary inspection have no probative value in a future trial. In practice
the first action
under investigation
is exactly
the interrogation of
Mr. Kiril Petkov
in his capacity as a witness. This action marks the beginning of pre-trial proceedings in exceptional cases, such as the present one. retain evidence or apprehend the perpetrator).
The aim is to avoid sending the materials from the preliminary inspection to the prosecutor’s office, which will assess whether there is enough evidence to initiate criminal proceedings.
In his testimony, Mr. Petkov recreated in several lines what he had learned from publications in the media, as he had not directly accepted any facts and circumstances in the case under investigation in order to testify. In the same testimony, however, he states that the previous day – March 16, 2022, he met the European Attorney General Mrs.
Laura Kjoveshi
with data from
the file and she
was expressed
opinion before
him that there was
data for
done
crime,
without specifying what crime and by whom it was committed. This is proof that Mr. Petkov was acquainted with the materials from the file even before March 17, 2022, when he called the police authorities, which is completely illegal.
At 7 pm, teams of investigators and other police officers gathered in the GDNP building, and it was not until 7.30 pm that they were told where to go. There are no conditions of urgency, as more than 3 months of preliminary investigation is carried out for a case that allegedly occurred in the period from 2014 to 2019.
The police officers did not obtain prior permission from the competent Bulgarian court to carry out the searches, and nevertheless carried them out. After receiving information about what was happening, I immediately went to the home of Mr. Boyko Borissov.
Arriving on the spot, I was not allowed more than 40 minutes. When I was brought into his home, the search and personal search were over and a report was drawn up.
Not found
no
items and
documents that
to matter
for the deed, and
nothing was seized
Meanwhile, the press center of the Ministry of Interior leaked a message that Borisov, Arnaudova, Goranov and Menda Stoyanova were detained during a large-scale operation by the police and the European Prosecutor’s Office in the investigation of 120 cases of misuse of European funds. At the time of the press release, investigators had no intention of detaining anyone. Someone probably ordered them to do it, and they announced it on the spot in front of me.
By this time, hundreds of his supporters and activists had gathered in front of Mr Borissov’s home and had virtually blocked the possibility of him being removed from the property.
I cooperated
of the police
employees
to distract
the attention of
the protesters
in a certain direction so that the police team could take Mr Borisov out of his home. Otherwise, his supporters would not have given them that opportunity.
I went to the GDNP, where the three detainees – Mr. Boyko Borisov, Mr. Vladislav Goranov and Mrs. Sevdalina Arnaudova were handed orders for police detention for up to 24 hours. It turned out that Ms. Menda Stoyanova was at her home in Plovdiv and that she had not been searched, nor had any of the police searched for her or been interested in anything.
The detention orders for all three stated that they were being detained on suspicion of a possible crime under Art. 213a of the Penal Code (extortion),
without specifying
who they are
blackmailed
when they blackmailed him, what they blackmailed him for, how they blackmailed him.
On the morning of March 18, 2022, the Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Bulgaria announced that so far it has not been notified of the case and has not received any materials or reports.
Meanwhile, Mr. Kiril Petkov announced in a video statement: “Now we will see if the prosecution will side with the Bulgarian people,” whatever that means.
At 10.30 am on March 18, 2022, I received a call from an investigative police officer from the GDNP, who informed me that all three detainees would be released and questioned as witnesses.
Shortly after 11 o’clock I was received by an investigating police officer, who confirmed at the entrance of the building his intentions to release the persons. The moment we went up to his office, the same one
get a call
on the phone and
with sorrow to me
notify that there is
new “commandment”
and that the individuals will not be released and the case will be reported to the prosecutor’s office. I was left waiting in the waiting room for visitors on the ground floor of the building, where I stayed for more than 3 and a half hours without any information. Then I was forced to call the investigators on the phone, who told me that it was only at this point that they set out to report the case to the prosecutor’s office – around 3 p.m.
I visited the three detainees, who told me that so far no one had sought them for anything and that no action was being taken against them.
At 18.00 I called the investigators, as the standard working hours had expired and all employees had left the GDNP. They told me that they were in the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office and there was no decision on anything.
I immediately went to the Court House, where I filed a complaint at 6.30 pm. At the prosecutor’s office, I found the investigating police officers, who told me that they had not prepared any requests for the involvement of persons as defendants and their detention. I was told that everyone would be released and went to the GDNP. I also set off there at around 8.15 pm and the three detainees were released without charge.
All actions of the Ministry of Interior are illegal, because for the crime for which the pre-trial proceedings were instituted as a matter of urgency and due to the fact that Mr. Borisov and Mr. Goranov were members of the Council of Ministers at the time of its alleged commission, the investigation should be investigated. performed obligatorily by an investigator – art. 194, para. 1, item 2 of the PPC.
The investigators have not been in the system of the Ministry of Interior since 1991, but are part of the judiciary and subordinated to the prosecutor’s office. That is, all actions performed by the GDNP are illegal, performed by an incompetent authority and have no legal value.
According to the Law on the Ministry of the Interior, higher-ranking officials, including politicians – the Minister of the Interior and the Prime Minister, have no right to give them instructions and interfere in any way in their activities.
In contrast, after 11 pm on March 18, 2022, a press conference was held at the Council of Ministers by Mr. Kiril Petkov and Mr. Boyko Rashkov, who announced that the prosecutor’s office was to blame for everything and that the investigating police officers were here – above second floor. Confirmation of the described.
It turned out that no European Public Prosecutor’s Office was dealing with the case.
–
