France Supreme Court Gives Green Light to Bulgaria Borilski Trial

Young Bulgarians protest outside the main Court building in downtown Sofia against the not guilty verdict of the Veliko Turnovo Appellate Court in the Borilski murder case. Photo by Sofia Photo Agency

A team of magistrates from the French Supreme Court of Cassations has rejected the request of the suspects in Bulgaria’s Borilski case to annul the parallel French trial.

The news is reported Saturday by the Bulgarian National Radio (BNR), citing the French attorney for the mother of murdered Bulgarian Sorbonne student Martin Borilski.

The rule means the magistrates are conclusively giving “green light” to the parallel French trial.

The French trial is scheduled to start in the beginning of 2010.

In the summer of 2000, French firefighters discovered the brutally murdered Martin Borilski in his apartment in Paris. His body was tied down with a sweater, and his skull was broken with a dumbbell. There were 93 stabbing wounds on his corpse.

The two alleged killers, Georgi Zheliazkov and Stoyan Stoichkov, were acquitted by the first two Bulgarian instances - the Shumen District Court and the Veliko Turnovo Appellate Court.

Amidst the pressure of protest rallies and stark remarks on the part of French Ambassador to Bulgaria, Etienne de Poncins, in the beginning of March 2009, Bulgaria's Supreme Court of Cassations returned the "Borilski" murder case to the Appellate Court in the city of Veliko Tarnovo for retrial.

The Supreme Court magistrates based their decision on the lack of motives of the Appellate Court for the "not guilty" verdict. They further pointed out significant violations in the ways evidence has been collected, verified, analyzed and admitted and the fact that the financial state of the alleged perpetrators has not been investigated after July 18, 2000.

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