Reporter at Plovdiv24.bg talks with Stoyan Donkov, lawyer of the late Angel Lichkanov:
– Attorney Donkov, what happens after the death of your client Angel Lichkanov?
– A pre-trial proceeding was instituted in the District Prosecutor’s Office against an unknown perpetrator for causing the death of Angel Lichkanov due to negligence.
– What does “unknown perpetrator” mean?
– Because they don’t know who is to blame for this death. The standard investigation period is 2 months. Yesterday they took him for an autopsy, they will determine the cause of death.
– In the courtroom you said that he has a sick heart, suffers from several diseases…
– A few – yes. This is not a secret, it is established, it is documented. Yesterday he was taken to the hospital at 11 o’clock to see a cardiologist, at my request, so that he could be tested, because he had a heart attack in custody 4 days earlier. After the cardiologist from “St. Ivan Rilski” told both in writing and verbally to the detention officers that this man needed resuscitation immediately, these specialist officials took him back to the detention center, locked him up and just waited for him to die. Of a massive heart attack, most likely.
– Isn’t there a medical person in the detention center who can provide help on the spot?
– What kind of medical person can be in custody who is a specialist in emergency cardiology? There is a paramedic in the detention center who, apart from prescribing aspirin and analgin, does nothing else, and this is world-famous. There is no. In the detention center, in such cases they call an ambulance. Yesterday, an ambulance was called, arrived in front of the relatives, only to find the death and they left.
– Do you have information on whether the Ministry of Justice has ordered an internal investigation into this case?
– I have no idea what they ordered. What will happen is that we refer the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office to initiate pre-trial proceedings against the Plovdiv Prosecutor’s Office and against the employees of the Main Directorate “Serving out the punishments” from the arrest, to check who in the end was inactive enough not to be hospitalized after the examination by a cardiologist, in which it was indicated in writing that they should be hospitalized for resuscitation urgently.
– This is outside the pre-trial proceedings in Plovdiv?
– Yes, beyond what is formed. There is a very big conflict of interest. The Plovdiv Prosecutor’s Office opened a case to investigate who is to blame for the death of Angel Lichkanov due to negligence. At the same time, at 1:10 a.m., the Plovdiv Prosecutor’s Office received documents requesting that Lichkanov be immediately hospitalized in intensive care with a life-threatening condition, and the Plovdiv Prosecutor’s Office did nothing until his death and did not order him to be taken out of custody and taken to custody. Since only prosecutors are competent to order a person out of custody, even in a hospital emergency, who is to blame? The guilty person cannot file a case and investigate himself. That is why it is written in the law that this is done by the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office. We’ll get there.
– Will you seek rights under the State Liability Act?
– At the beginning of next week, there will be three such cases.
– Also in Sofia?
– No, in Plovdiv. Such is local jurisdiction by law.
– When do you expect Lichkanov’s body to be returned to his relatives?
– I can not say. I don’t know how many autopsies they will do, how many forensic medical examinations will then be appointed. Nobody has a clue. I am currently with my relatives, no one is informing them of anything. It got there yesterday with thousands of requests to let them see their dead relative before the autopsy for 5 minutes. The horror is total. Officials. They issued a death sentence and carried it out – that’s what happened.
– Do you have any recollection in your legal practice of any other case of death in remand custody?
– Such severe inactivity – no.
I have one who got a brain tumor from being arrested and being bullied. The man fainted in custody for three months. Dozens of times we put out requests to have him examined by a neurologist, because he kept passing out in detention and that didn’t happen. After his detention was over, it was discovered outside the detention center that he was sick and had a tumor. He too had been given xanax by a paramedic so he could sleep and not mumble. But there is no other case like Lichkanov’s. And hopefully not.
2023-07-21 11:16:56
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