“It was clear back in 2024 that this accusation would not hold up. The very legal structure of this accusation, for me, doomed it to failure from the start“. He said this in an interview for the show “Face to Face” on bTV, former acting Minister of Justice Andrey Yankulov on the court's decision in the case against Petyo Petrov, known as Pepi Euroto.
Yankulov, who was also part of the Anti-Corruption Fund, recalled that even when the indictment was filed, he predicted the failure of the case.
According to him, the indictment for document fraud was legally difficult to defend because it suggests that prosecutors were “misled“ by false documents.
“They could not have been misled by the evil genius of Pepi Euroto. This is more like a collaboration between the two,” the lawyer commented.
Yankulov emphasized that instead of a serious punishable crime, in the end it only amounted to a documentary violation that led to an administrative sanction.
“The prosecutor has this great power, which is practically unchallenged, to do whatever he wants“, the former justice minister believes.
According to him, the key decisions in the pre-trial phase – what to investigate, what charges to bring and against whom, are made almost entirely within the prosecutor's office, without sufficient external control.
He added that this is precisely what allows abuses: “Why is it abused? Precisely because it can“.
In the interview, Yankulov made comparisons between old scandals in the judicial system and the current dependencies surrounding the “Eight Dwarfs“ and Martin Bozanov-Notary.
“These activities have turned into serious bandit structures. This is not a club of interests where they talk about law and morality. These are literally criminal bandit structures“, Yankulov announced.
He pointed to the case of Yavor Zlatanov as an example of the serious consequences of such dependencies.
Yankulov also commented on the practice of landmark investigations starting with showy arrests and media leaks, but without a real finale in court: “All these cases are conducted like this. The goal is to get some kind of public stigma.“
According to him, evidence is often used not for convictions, but for media influence.
At the end of the conversation, Andrey Yankulov also commented on the scandal involving European Prosecutor Teodora Georgieva.
„There is no way to deny the government's involvement in these processes for the appointment of European prosecutors“, the former Minister of Justice emphasized.
According to me, the Bulgarian government participates at several stages in the procedure for the nomination and election of the European Prosecutor, who represents our country.
„The decision to appoint a European Prosecutor is political, because he is appointed by a political body“, the lawyer specified.
Yankulov stated that there remain „very serious doubts“ about the rearrangement of the candidacies for the influence of Petyo Petrov.