Bulgarians Sentenced in France over Gas Pump Skimming Attempt

A French court has sentenced two Bulgarian citizens to 2 years of imprisonment over having sought to install skimming devices in the city of Reims.

They were arrested during an inspection by the customs agency on Wednesday afternoon, local daily L'union l'Ardennais has reported.

Zahari Tsekov, 22, and Viktor Grozdanov, 36, were considered by the court to be "small fries" executing orders of a bigger organization.

The paper has attributed ATM skimming frauds to Bulgarian organized crime networks, which "managed to recycle computer skills of former Eastern-bloc spies".