The notorious businessman from the town of Dupnitsa Plamen Galev has been detained under a Prosecutor's order for 72 hours at the Unit for Combating Organized Crime (GDBOP).

Galev's business partner Angel Hristov said that they both learned about the authorities search for Galev from a radio news broadcast, and Galev turned himself in to GDBOP. Hristov declared that the Friday detention was yet another attempt to discredit them.

Hristov further said that Galev has been detained because he failed to appear as a wittiness at a certain trial.

Around 6 am on Friday, GDBOP officers entered the residencies of both "businessmen" in the village of Resilovo and began a search of the estate.

Hristov further confirmed that it was possible the later operation was connected to Lidya Pavlova, a reporter for the local "Struma" newspaper, who had filed a lawsuit against one of the businessmen bodyguards known under the alias "Konana.". The reporter has filed the suit because the bodyguard had severely beaten her son in a discotheque in Dupnitsa. Galev and his accountant, allegedly, pressured Pavlova to withdraw the complaint.

Is is expected that Galev would be transferred later on Friday to the building of the National investigation Services.

In mid-October, Plamen Galev and Angel Hristov AKA the Galev Brothers appeared in the building of Bulgaria's National Investigating Service to be interrogated over committing tax and financial crimes.

The day before the police searched a number of venues in Sofia, Pernik, and Dupnitsa, including car dealerships, offices, administrative buildings, and apartments, and confiscated evidence.

Some of the searches were made in offices and car dealerships owned by the Galev Brothers. In October, the special police forces also sealed off their estate in village of Resilovo close to the town of Dupnitsa.

Immediately after the start of the raid, the two men went missing for about 24 hours. They later turned themselves in, again saying that they were in business meetings all day and learned about the search from the media.

After the interrogation the Galev brothers were not charged with any crimes and were released.

The Galev Brothers, became publicly known after it was leaked to the media that the former Interior Minister Rumen Petkov had met with them while they were under investigation for organized crime activities.

The information spurred a scandal, which eventually led to the resignation of Petkov as Interior Minister.

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