Caretaker Justice Minister Andrey Yankulov has proposed that the Prosecutors' College of the Supreme Judicial Council initiate disciplinary proceedings against Borislav Sarafov, who is currently acting as Prosecutor General, with a view to his dismissal over alleged disciplinary violations.
The proposal calls for the most severe disciplinary sanction – removal from office.
According to the minister, the disciplinary liability of Borislav Sarafov for actions and omissions carried out in his capacity as de facto acting Prosecutor General cannot be excluded on the grounds that his holding of the position is unlawful.
“In recent months, a series of written statements attributed to the Prosecutor's Office have been circulated in the public domain, creating significant institutional tension between the Bulgarian Prosecutor's Office and the courts, damaging the prestige of the judiciary and undermining public confidence in it,” the minister states in the proposal, which sets out five groups of relevant circumstances.
One of these is based primarily on the Prosecutor's Office own published official communication between the Bulgarian and the European Public Prosecutor’s Office concerning the case of the temporarily suspended European Prosecutor from Bulgaria, Teodora Georgieva.
According to the Prosecutor's Office publication and media reports, Borislav Sarafov stated at a meeting with European prosecutors that the Bulgarian Prosecutor's Office possessed evidence that Georgieva had received bribes, while the investigation during which that evidence was gathered was initiated only after that meeting.
Subsequently, although the as yet unidentified supervising prosecutor in the investigation made a written assertion, addressed to the European Chief Prosecutor Laura Kövesi, that sufficient evidence of corruption had been gathered against Georgieva, the Bulgarian prosecutor took no steps to initiate criminal proceedings, as he was obliged to do in such circumstances.
Despite being aware of this fact, Borislav Sarafov did not exercise oversight for legality over the prosecutor supervising the investigation.
Two of the remaining groups of grounds relate to a gross conflation by Borislav Sarafov of his public function with personal interest, as well as the impermissible use of the institutional authority of the Prosecutor's Office for purposes incompatible with the powers of the office he effectively holds.
These refer to widely known cases in which Borislav Sarafov requested the recusal of a judge from the Sofia City Court, who was due to rule on an appeal against the refusal by the “ad hoc prosecutor” Daniela Taleva to initiate pre-trial proceedings on materials that became known as “EuroLeaks”.
They also concern a request to the President and Vice-President of the Supreme Court of Cassation, as well as to the Prosecutorial College of the Supreme Judicial Council, to exclude more than five hundred judges from random allocation in the selection of the next “ad hoc prosecutor” – all members of the Union of Judges in Bulgaria.
Sarafov’s requests, although concerning him personally as an individual affected or potentially affected by an inspection or investigation by the special prosecutor, were submitted in the institutional capacity he claims to hold, thereby impermissibly engaging the entire institution of the Prosecutor's Office of the Republic of Bulgaria.
The fourth group of circumstances relates to one of the rare public statements made by the acting Prosecutor General – concerning the “Petrohan” case – in which Sarafov made an ill-judged public remark at the very outset of the investigation, when investigative hypotheses should have been at a very early stage of development.
From the statement, which provides specific assessments of individual facts related to the investigation, there is a real risk of influencing the internal conviction of the supervising prosecutor and the investigative authorities, which should be based on an objective, comprehensive and complete examination of all circumstances of the case, as well as on the law,” the reasoning states.
The fifth circumstance is linked to a response issued by the Prosecutor's Office, prompted by a publication on the website of the Supreme Court of Cassation, which stated that the powers of the acting Prosecutor General had been terminated by law and that a request to reopen a criminal case submitted by the acting Prosecutor General did not constitute valid referral to the court.
The response contains unacceptable assessments, such as: “the leadership of the Supreme Court of Cassation is involving the institution in an attempt to achieve illegitimate objectives”, and that “through its current actions it is openly contributing to the erosion of public authority towards the main pillar of the state – its justice system, in unison with certain political forces.”
It is stated that the Supreme Court of Cassation was “attempting to manipulate public opinion” and that “through its actions the leadership of the Supreme Court of Cassation is pursuing solely political objectives and further deepening the situation of instability within the judiciary, which in turn is driven by certain political circles and their individual representatives within the judiciary itself.”
As the de facto representative of the Prosecutor's Office, through the public position he expressed, Borislav Sarafov formulates highly extreme claims affecting the independence, reputation and authority of the Supreme Court of Cassation, leading to a breach of established institutional ethics.
In conclusion, caretaker Minister Yankulov emphasises that the actions and omissions of the acting Prosecutor General constitute serious disciplinary violations, for which the most severe disciplinary sanction should be imposed – removal from office. He calls on the Prosecutors' College of the Supreme Judicial Council to urgently initiate disciplinary proceedings.
All the circumstances set out in the caretakeer Minister’s proposal are based solely and exclusively on publicly available information, do not contain any previously undisclosed facts the confidentiality of which should be preserved, and therefore, given the very high public interest and the significance of the case, the Ministry of Justice has published the full document on its website.
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