Bulgarian Interior Hinders Ex Defense Minister Тrial

Special police forces busted Bulgaria's ex Defense Minister Nikolay Tsonev (middle) in the Military Medical Academy as he was just receiving a doctor's note certifying he was sick so that he can skip an interrogation. Photo by Interior Ministry

The Bulgarian Interior Ministry failed to comply with a court order and make available the full video recording of the arrest of former Defense Minister, Nikolay Tsonev.

The news was reported by the private TV channel bTV.

The magistrates were able to see only two minutes of the tape from the arrest of the three defendants in the case.

One of them, Tencho Popov, says the recording does not show him lying down on the floor unconscious and with a crack in the head.

The defense counsel further insists what has been made public is only a tiny part of the recording which is filled with scenes of police brutality.

If the Interior Ministry continues to refuse to submit the full tape, it would be seized with a warrant of the Supreme Prosecutor's Office after Easter, when the trial is to resume.

It also became known during the same court session on Thursday that the bribery trial against Tsonev has reached a final dead-lock over the failure of the court to find independent experts.

The judge in the case, Ivan Koev, informed he was unable to find such experts.

In the beginning of February, Koev reported he had spoken unofficially with a number of independent experts, who declined to participate over worries about pressure and eventual dismissal from work.

All defense lawyers adamantly oppose using experts who not employed by the Forensic Institute of the Interior Ministry, and the Court made a commitment to look for people outside the Interior Ministry system.

The videotapes of the arrests of the 3 defendants in the case will be shown at the next court session under the defense counsel request. The magistrates have repeatedly asked the Interior to provide those tapes.

The experts are needed for 2 analyses – a technical one to find out if the recordings of conversations between the three defendants, made with special surveillance devices (SRS), were tampered with and a graphology one to establish if the same person had asked authorization to use SRS and has given the permission.

Former Defense Minister, Nikolay Tsonev, who was part of the previous, Socialist-led cabinet of the Three-Way Coalition from the quota of former Tsar Simeon Saxe-Coburg's party National Movement for Stability and Prosperity (NMSP), was arrested on April 1, 2010, in a much advertised police operation that generated strong public controversy.

Sofia City Court judge, Petar Santirov, and financial consultant, Tencho Popov, were also arrested during the same operation.

Tsonev, Santirov and Popov were charged with bribing investigator, Petyo Petrov, to forge evidence that would lead to a positive outcome for Tsonev of an investigation against him. The amount of the bribe was reported to have been EUR 60 000.

Investigator Petyo Petrov was working on the case of a BGN 120 M contract that Tsonev signed with a private company while he was Minister in 2008-2009. The investigation of the deal was started at the end of 2009 and has not been taken to court yet.

The arrest of Nikolay Tsonev on April 1, which was filmed and broadcast by the Interior Ministry, spurred a public outrage of police brutality as masked police officers made him kneel to the ground while Deputy Sofia Prosecutor Roman Vasilev called him "a criminal". The Ethics Commission at Bulgaria's Supreme Judicial Council (VSS) later sanctioned Vasilev, for his inappropriate behavior during the arrest.

The former Defense Minister is suing the Bulgarian state in Strasbourg, complaining of "humiliating treatment" by the police.

On November 24, special surveillance tapes were shown for the first time in an "open doors" court trial in Bulgaria.

On Monday, Tsonev, was acquitted on the third and last count of abuse of power in another case which was tired by the military court.

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