Mr. Boris Velchev, Prosecutor General of the Republic of Bulgaria

• The criminal law has to be rational and to enable effective counteraction to crime
• Bulgaria is among the countries with highest percentage of guilty verdicts

Mr. Prosecutor General, how do you evaluate the past year? Was it good for the Bulgarian prosecutors? What can be pointed out as the greatest success and where did the efforts of public prosecution failed?
It was a difficult year. As you know, rather critical European reports about the Bulgarian judiciary were received. At the same time, this was the year we had the first good words about the Bulgarian prosecutor’s office in these reports. I am saying this in order to find a balance in the evaluation. Obviously, it would be too exaggerated to say that “last year was wholly successful.” The hundreds of thousands of criminal actions and preliminary investigations carried out by the prosecutor’s office – this is a huge work which does not always give results in the expected timelines. On the other hand, the results achieved are impressive, I think, even in those aspects of our work which were critically assessed by the European Commission until now, such as the counteraction to money laundering, EU fund crimes, and organized crime.

At the moment emblematic figures in organized crime are detained, or the cases against them are in trial phase, or are wanted by a European warrant of arrest.
These facts and especially the successes in counteracting EU fund crimes were appreciated by the European Commission. Unfortunately, external evaluation is always more generous than internal evaluation. The EC Report of June 23, 2009 noted the good results in the work of the prosecutor’s office and underscored that these are due to the efforts of individual actors in this institution. This is a quotation. And what I don’t understand is why no one asked who are these individual actors at the prosecutor’s office thanks to whom the evaluations of the Bulgarian judiciary, and the state in general, are much milder. If the opposite was the case and there was a text saying that the poor evaluation in Bulgaria was due to individual actors at the prosecutor’s office, we all know there wouldn’t be a minute without your colleagues, journalists asking me to give the names of these people! I am saying this to characterize the environment in which the prosecutor’s office operates. It is not a comfortable environment. It is an environment of super expectations, often incomprehensibly aggressive – both the media and public environment. An environment that contains two mutually exclusive aspects and tendencies: on the one hand, pronounced public distrust in the judicial system, and the prosecution in particular, and on the other hand, an increased number of warnings, applications, complaints to the prosecutor’s office requesting assistance. I am saying this to draw your attention to an aspect that I think is unjustly ignored. Evaluating the year for the Bulgarian prosecutor’s office we must do justice to the 1600 persons, and with the examining magistrates this number exceeds 2000, who worked hard indeed. And in assessing the efficiency of their work we must take into account their capacities. The volume of work, which prosecutors in Bulgaria are compelled to do every workday, is enormous. I would say, it surpasses the reasonable limits within which we can require a creative approach on the part of the public prosecutors. One of our tasks during the current year is to seek understanding from the political power in the country and at least a little restrict the work-load at the prosecutor’s office and in the other bodies of the judiciary. Law is an art. When we turn the magistrates and prosecutors from artists into white-collar workers who solely need to watch the timeline to deliver judgement – the meaning of the Law is lost.

What will be the priorities in the work of the Bulgarian prosecutor’s office in 2010?
Our big efforts will be focused on routine work, which cannot cease, but our main strategic goal will be reduction of the excessive work-load for some of the prosecutor’s offices in the country. We will achieve this through internal measures and through redistribution of cases from prosecutor’s offices in Sofia to prosecutor’s offices in the country, where they have less work. I hope also through a purposeful policy of the Supreme Judicial Council for transformation of vacant positions in Sofia’s prosecutor’s offices.

The prosecutor’s office is some kind of universal body in the country. There is no public issue that is not referred to it in some form or another. I think this should be put an end to. Not only because this overburdens the prosecutor’s office and prevents it from concentrating on its proper work – the combat of grave crimes – but also because this demotivates all other control bodies in the country, which are actually the backbone of what we call statehood.

The prosecutor’s office should deal with particular public problems only when these clearly and definitely constitute a crime.

At present the practice is quite the contrary. Whatever comes up – civil law issues, matters in the competence of administrative bodies, even purely political issues if you like, personal matters – everyone tries to have them solved by the prosecutor’s office. Perhaps this is a manifestation of trust, or in some cases attempts are made to deliberately misuse us and seek us as arbiters on topics outside our immediate competences, anyway this work-load of the prosecutor’s office is excessive and it should be regulated within 2010.

Currently amendments to the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code are being prepared. Will these solve some of the problems and difficulties that Bulgarian prosecutors encounter daily?
I suppose they will solve part of the problems, particularly the amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code which are important and necessary for the activity of the prosecutor’s office. However, I differ from the view that the problems of the prosecutor’s office stem solely and only from the procedural legislation. Yes, it is important. Some of its aspects, if corrected, would make our work easier and more efficient, but
the main problem is the substantive criminal law

I must remind you that the Criminal Code, which we still apply in 2010, was drawn in the distant 1968, for a quite different economic, social and cultural reality. The numerous patches and amendments made meanwhile – I stopped counting them after the sixtieth – do not give the impression of consistency in this law. It is a chaotic conglomeration of outdated provisions and at the same time poor attempts to address the modern forms of crime. Until Bulgaria gets a modern, I would say rational Criminal Code which really incriminates only the most dangerous phenomena in the state, all other attempts at changing the legislation would just have a palliative effect.

Do you have a preferred model of criminal law? Which of the European criminal laws is best suited for Bulgaria, in your opinion?
Even if I did, I wouldn’t comment it because it is not for the prosecutor’s office to give models. I know that there are many different models of criminal law in the world. I do wish however that the model adopted, whatever it is, would reflect several things.

To differentiate criminal violations

at least in two categories – light and grave offences and misdemeanours, as the terms in the old Bulgarian criminal law were, and to envisage a disencumbered procedure for the punishment of lighter offences. In the new criminal code I would like to see settled the forms of criminality. I want us no longer to need to wonder how to adapt provisions created in 1968 to the contemporary forms of criminal activity – e.g. in the field of public procurement. That is, whatever model is adopted, what I would look for is for the model to be rational and to enable effective counteraction to crime.

In 2010 will there be convictions in the so-called ‘trials of public significance’? And will the expectations of the Bulgarian public be met?
Both questions are easy to answer. I am sure there will be convictions and, frankly, I do not doubt that my colleagues have done a good job and where indictments have been filed there will certainly be judgements or at least I expect so. I should change my job if I expect differently. As to whether the public will be satisfied, I can tell you right away – of course not. The Bulgarian public, as we know, is too critical towards its institutions. However, the point is not whether we will satisfy everybody’s claims of justice, but whether we will gradually build an environment where respect for the institutions and the work of their employees would be cultivated in the Bulgarian public, including through the media. Bulgaria is among the countries with highest percentage of guilty verdicts, about 94–95%, which means that the efficiency of our work is not as critically low as the public sometimes believe. Therefore, if I may voice a wish – I wish we would be a little better understood.