The district court in Sliven has released Bilyana Petrova early from prison, who together with the former mayor of “Youth" Desislava Ivancheva and Petko Dyulgerov were convicted of soliciting and receiving a bribe from businessman Alexander Vaklin.
This was reported by Lex.bg.
The early release was decreed by judge Georgi Yordanov of the court in Sliven, and it is clear from his ruling that a positive opinion for Petrova's release was also expressed by the head of the prison in Sliven. The development of the case became clear from a post on Petrova's Facebook page, where it is stated, however, that the court's decision was protested by the prosecution. For this, Petrova has not yet been released, and the appeals court in Burgas will have the final say.
At the end of 2022, the Supreme Court of Cassation (SCC) finally convicted all three, who received effective sentences. Ivancheva was sentenced to 6 years in prison for being the mayor of “Mladost" in 2018, through blackmail, she demanded 250,000 euros from Vaklin in order to move his files to the municipality, then she reduced the requested amount to 187,000 euros, and on April 17, she accepted the first part of the money – the marked 70,000 euros that were found in her car. Her former deputy, Bilyana Petrova, was sentenced to 5 years in prison, and Ivancheva's predecessor as mayor of Mladost. – Petko Dyulgerov – 4 years in prison. The ruling of the court in Sliven for the release of Petrova is dated July 3.
It makes clear that as of that date she had served over a year and seven months of her sentence in prison. More than two years were deducted from her detention and almost 3 months from work. Thus, the court calculated that Petrova has already served almost 4 years of the sentence and she has another year and 17 days left. It is clear from the opinion of the prison administration that, according to them, Petrova's risk of recidivism is medium due to the fluctuations found.
„Positive change is expressed in awareness of part of the reasons for the act, but the main reason for retaining the risk is insufficiently changed thinking skills. The convict still transferred a significant part of the responsibility for the act to external factors and persons", says the position of the prison administration to the court. At the same time, however, it was noted that already at the end of last year, Petrova was on a light regimen, worked and was awarded twice. It has also been reported that the presence of education, qualifications and family support increase protections against recidivism, and therefore the administration concludes that she can be released early.
The same conclusion was reached by the court, which said in its decision that Petrova had not been punished up to this point, there were no violations of the internal order, she showed initiative and cooperation in social and educational events, she worked, she had established work habits , was rewarded and encouraged through regime change.