THE FOUR POLICE OFFICERS ACCUSED OF ASSISTING MIGRANT TRAFFICKERS WILL REMAIN IN CUSTODY

The Appellate Specialised Court in Bulgaria has ruled that the three police officers who were accused of taking bribes from migrant traffickers will remain in custody. The fourth of the detained police officers who was on duty in the sentry box on the night of the arrests will remain under house arrest.

The four police officers were detained during a special operation near the town of Slivnitsa on the night of 29th of July. The prosecution says the defendants were taking bribes from migrant traffickers, 50 euro per car with irregular migrants, in order to secure undisturbed transportation of the migrants to the border.

The defendants asked for a lighter measure. The three policemen, Georgi Zhekov, Prodan Georgiev and Nikoli Grigorov lodged a request, asking not to be photographed or filmed in the courtroom. The fourth one, Krasimir Evtimov who is under house arrest refused to comment.

The prosecution has only one witness, Ivailo Nikolov. He told the court he was stopped for a check by the police officers while he was driving a car carrying irregular migrants towards Kalotina border crossing. According to his story, the policeman Zhekov placed financial conditions in order to facilitate undisturbed transportation of the migrants. The prosecution says that after some time the police officers started themselves to transport irregular migrants because it was more profitable than taking bribes.

Emanuil Yordanov, the lawyer of the police officers says that the whole absurdity of this case is that the person involved in human trafficking and who admits so, is the witness and those who allegedly assisted him are accused of being an organized criminal group and were arrested.”

The lawyers accused the prosecution in generalities and media propaganda. According to them, for four months of investigation, there is not a single particular car with offenders described in the case. According to investigators, 150 euro were found in Zhekov’s pocket, described in banknotes, left by traffickers in the sentry box to Evtimov.

Lyudmil Rangelov – defence lawyer of Krasimir Evtimov: "He went to give the money – it was for Zhoro. He nodded in agreement. The money was left and that is the involvement. He neither passed the money, nor touched it. Just nodding ... (the lawyer laughs)

All the arguments of the defence were rejected by magistrates. The fact that the main witness admits his involvement does not compromise his testimony, the court decided and pointed out that he, as part of the criminal scheme, presented detailed description of it.

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