Romania extradited to Bulgaria the suspects in phone fraud

The Romanian authorities extradited the criminal group suspects detained for telephone fraud in a joint police operation in Gorna Oryahovitsa and Bucharest on April 18. Under strong security measures, the detainees on May 8 were handed over to the Bulgarian authiorities at the Danube Bridge border crossing, from where they would be transported to Sofia.

The alleged leader of the group, Borislav Dimitrov, who was sentenced 8 times for telephone frauds and theft, is also among the arrested.

The telephone fraudsters defrauded Bulgarians of 8 million BGN in 2018 and of more than 2 million BGN in the recent months. They acted mainly from the territory of Romania, and in the places where the victims were they sent couriers to take the money. They called 150 phone numbers per day, tricking people to believe they were assisting police operation aiming to capture phone fraudsters.

The group was subject to investigation for 2 years before it was disrupted.

If found guilty, the law provided for 3 to 10 years of imprisonment for telephone fraud.