The Stara Zagora District Court handed Thursday a three-year suspended sentence and five years' probation to Bulgarian football legend and former Mayor of Sliven Yordan Lechkov.

Lechkov was declared guilty of malfeasance in office conducted in February 2010 in his capacity of mayor of the southeastern Bulgarian city.

Lechkov was also banned from taking up managerial posts in the next three years.

Plamen Stefanov, District Prosecutor of Sliven, insisted that Lechkov should be sentenced effectively for signing orders for the removal of aggregate materials out of the deer ravines near the villages of Topolchane, Kaloyanovo and Sotire in February 2010.

The document signed by Lechkov ordered the Eco Sediment company to clean up the ravines at the insistence of the village mayors.

During the cleaning up, some 7231 cubic meters of aggregate materials worth BGN 14 642 were taken out of the sites in violation of Bulgarian environmental legislation.

Under Bulgarian laws in the sphere, the aggregate materials, which are state property, should have only been pushed aside rather than taken out of the ravines.

In an interview late on Thursday, Lechkov vowed to appeal, stressing that he had done everything by the book, given the crisis situation at the time due to the floods in the three villages.

He claimed that the purpose of the proceedings against him had been to deprive him of the right to hold highly responsible positions.

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