The son of the businessman Grisha Ganchev – Danail, condemned the prosecution to pay him compensation of BGN 180,000 because of the so-called "sugar case", in which the Ganchevs were finally acquitted two years ago, reported "Lex".
The investigation began in 2012, when Danail Ganchev was also detained, and the charges were about an organized criminal group led by Grisha Ganchev, in which eight people participated and committed tax crimes.
An indictment was filed only after the defendants requested that the case either be dropped or go to court, and then the Ganchevs were acquitted in three instances. The charge was for tax crimes for over BGN 700,000, which, according to the prosecutor's office, was committed through the sale without invoices of sugar produced in the Burgas and Devne sugar factories. According to the indictment, the sales were carried out through the companies “Simek” EOOD, “Nickdonald Commerce” AD and “Lozev” Ltd.
Last year, Danail Ganchev filed a lawsuit against the prosecutor's office in the Sofia City Court (SGS) for BGN 120,000 in non-property damages from the illegal accusation, as well as another BGN 59,000 that he paid to lawyers during the ten years the case continued .
The city court fully accepted Ganchev's claims, and its decision makes it clear that he would have received a significantly larger compensation, but he did not ask for it.
In his claim, Danail Ganchev emphasizes that he was initially arrested in May 2012 and remained in custody for nearly three months, although he had no intention of hiding and there was no evidence that he had committed a crime.< /p>
He explains that the conditions in the detention center were terrible, especially with the record high temperatures at the time. Separately, Ganchev says that his health permanently deteriorated, he suffered a hypertensive crisis in detention, he was taken to a hospital, where he was humiliatingly locked to the bed with handcuffs on his hands and feet, even though he was in a serious state of health.
The son of Grisha Ganchev claims that the illegal case “serious and irreversible“ has damaged his good name and human dignity, as his life as a young and highly educated person who had no criminal record was completely messed up and ruined. He describes in detail how, at the age of 15, he went to study in Switzerland, where he graduated with honors from college and then went on to graduate school in London.
As a qualified financier, he returned to Bulgaria and had the ambition to establish himself in “Litex” and in 2011 he became the head of “Litex Commerce”. However, in his most active period and only a year after his return to Bulgaria, he was arrested and his long-term problems with justice began, which scorched his ambitions. Ganchev recalls that before each hearing in the then special court, there were detailed reports in the media, and the negatives about him continued to this day, because he limited his social contacts. Testimony about all these experiences of Ganchev was also given by his lawyer, who testified that Grisha Ganchev's son also feared for his life in detention.
In her decision, judge Bojana Zhelyazkova wrote that the case had been ongoing for almost 10 years and Ganchev's suffering had been proven. However, she explicitly draws attention to the media response and the responsibility of the prosecutor's office.
„The charge brought against the claimant, holding a managerial position, could not help but be covered in the press because of its sensational appearance, artificially created by an unsubstantiated accusation, with which his good name and honor are damaged,”, the decision says .
The court also noted Ganchev's deteriorating health, for which an expert opinion was also accepted, his thwarted education, problems in his professional activity and the humiliation of the heavy accusation, in order to decide that the fair compensation would be BGN 200,000, but Ganchev requested only BGN 120,000.
„The overall assessment of these circumstances motivates the court to accept that a fair amount of compensation for the non-pecuniary damages suffered by the plaintiff would be BGN 200,000, but since the court cannot rule on a superpetitum, it should be respected the claim up to its stated amount, namely BGN 120,000," the court reasoned. In addition, he respects and claims for property damages of Ganchev, who has submitted written evidence of paid attorney's fees for 59,000 BGN. Thus, the prosecutor's office was sentenced to pay Danail Ganchev nearly BGN 179,000, to which were added BGN 600 in costs for the case at the SGS.
However, the decision is not final and can be appealed to the Sofia Court of Appeal.