Two sergeants from the police of the town of Velingrad killed a man after an apparent random shooting in what they believed was a deserted area.
The two policemen, who were nearby a mountain hostel, fired a bullet at a concrete pillar to check whether their weapons are fit. The bullet is believed to have rebounded and killed the man, Georgi Bozhanov, 58, a father of three.
Stoyan Patsalov and Rossen Ovcharov were touring the region around the mountain hostel without permission, reports say, adding the policemen might have been drunken.
They took the man into their car and drove him to the hospital. Before they managed to get there however the man died.
"I will insist that the sergeants get the heaviest punishment, including verdicts," Interior Minister Rumen Petkov said at a press conference later in the day.
An investigation into the case has been launched. The head of the police in the town of Pazardhzik submitted his resignation in the wake of the murder.