The Sofia City Court ruled Wednesday to keep their former colleague, Judge Petar Santirov behind bars.

Santirov appealed his permanent detention measure with the motive he is already suspended from his post by Bulgaria’s Supreme Judicial Council (VSS) and because of this he cannot influence the investigation.

Santirov was arrested in the beginning of April at his home in the Sofia neighborhood ‘Gotse Delchev’ in a police operation that also saw former Defense Minister Nikolay Tsonev and financial consultant Tencho Popov busted on bribery charges.

The 3 are allegedly guilty of bribing investigator, Petio Petrov, to forge evidence to lead to a positive outcome for Tsonev during his forthcoming court trail. The amount of the bribe was reported to have been EUR 60 000.

Petrov was working on the case of a BGN 120 M contract that Tsonev signed with a private company while he was Minister in 2008-2009.

The judge, Vladimir Astradzhiev, said Wednesday that there is reasonable doubt Santirov had committed the crime and he is likely to commit a new one, but added there is some evidence his former colleague was enticed to participate in the bribe scheme and maybe Petrov, himself, had asked for the money.

According to the magistrates this is a scheme that had been used many times and not just something incidental.

The trial was open to the public on the insistence of Astradzhiev, who said the information collected through special surveillance devices did not include classified data.

The monitoring prosecutor pointed out that charges against other individuals might be pressed soon, adding he did not have any evidence of Petrov's involvement in the crime.

The defense council stated the investigators failed to honor Santirov's request to include in the case invoices and transcripts from his conversations with Petrov that would offer proof it was the latter who actively sought contacts.

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