Ministers in Jail? May be – in Some Other Life

The Law on the Amnesty was adopted by the previous National Assembly on March 26 and entered into effect on April 22, 2009. It in fact frees from guilt all officials who have committed malfeasance before July 1, 2008, including power misuse, exceeding of rights, and non-performance.

The scandalous law, on which Bulgaria News has already reported, consists of all in all 2 pages, where in 4 articles, 3 sections, and a total of 13 paragraphs, amnesty is declared for all breaches punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment committed before July 1, 2008. Exceptions are only admitted for perpetrations committed under intoxication or if resulting in hard injury or death.

The law even rules that in case belongings or money would happen to be confiscated in the process of such a case, those should be returned to rightful claimants. The following paragraph mercifully enables Themis to treat such crimes as administrative breaches and seek administrative responsibility from the amnestied.

It’s not clear what a public necessity might have provoked the appearance of such a law,

but whatever the legislators might have had in mind, it makes impossible prosecuting officials, ministers included, who have used their power in an illegal manner up to mid-2008.

Article 387, section 3 of Chapter 13 of the Penal Code, where Misdemeanour in Office is treated, reads literally the following:

Paragraph (1) Who abuses power or his official status, does not fulfil his official duties or stretches his authority, thus causing harmful consequences, shall be punished by imprisonment of up to three years.

(2) (Amend., SG 28/82) If the act has caused major consequences or it has been committed systematically by a superior regarding subordinate, the punishment shall be imprisonment of one to eight years.

(3) (New, SG 89/86) If the act under the preceding paragraphs has been committed for the purpose of acquiring by the perpetrator for himself or for another person property benefit or to cause damage to another, the punishment shall be imprisonment of one to five years under paragraph 1, from three to eight years under paragraph 2, and in particularly major cases – from three to ten years, whereas the court shall also rule revoking of right according to art. 37, item 6.

The especially important Paragraph (4)

reads:

If the harmful consequences have been caused by negligence, the punishment shall be: under paragraph 1 - imprisonment of up to two years, and under paragraph 2 – imprisonment of up to five years.

I.e.,

each misdemeanour committed by negligence before July 1, 2008, is not a crime at all,

as it shall be amnestied under the law of March 26, 2009...

What’s more, under Article 3 of Chapter 24 of the Penal Procedure Code, ”Criminal proceedings shall not be instituted and, if instituted, they shall be terminated, where: 2. The perpetrator is not criminally responsible due to amnesty”.

Hardly would anyone imagine that all ministers, deputy ministers, state agencies’ heads, and other so high profile officials compose themselves the documents they sign. Behind each and every finalized property exchange, each and every state property sale, each and every construction permit, if you like, stand multitudinous teams, diluting responsibility along the state administration floors. Each high official has the ideal chance to hide behind their insufficient competency and information on any problem in order of avoiding a charge of premeditated abuse.

And if there’s no intent, so it’s by incautiousness.

And when it’s by incautiousness, it shall be punished by imprisonment of up to 5 years. And if it’s of up to 5 years, this means there is already amnesty issued for it, and a penal procedure could not be constituted at all. Any first-year law-student may just laugh at an ambitious prosecutor, waving those two pages under his nose. And all the confidence to the judicial system, so lavishly demonstrated by Prime-Minister Boyko Borissov, is in vain, for the law is a fact, even if amended, at may not be applied backdated...

Reminder: head of the national central heating facility Valentin Dimitrov (Valio - the Heat), has already put to use this law and all charges over mismanagement against him dropped.

The only chance of the new power to shine in the role of justice dispensing Nemesis are the

acts of members of the former cabinet committed after July 1, 2008.

Probably that’s why the first arrows are directed to the scandalous exchanges of lands and forests that took place in one only week in January. The moratorium on exchange deals was voted in the Parliament on January 23, 2009 and published in an extraordinary issue of State Gazette on February 2. Former head of the Forests State Agency is now under investigation namely over deals concluded between these two dates.

But the arm of law cannot reach to this same Stefan Yuroukov in his capacity of Deputy Minister in charge of forests, forestry and hunting reserve with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forests, which was transformed on July 18, 2008 into Ministry of Agriculture and Food and the State Agency on Forests was taken out of its structure and sent under the direct subjection of the Council of Ministers.

Each crime committed before July 1, 2008 is just an administrative breach, unless prosecutors prove officials are permanently intoxicated while signing important documents, or that these signatures have caused death.