Ana Kamceva, the wife of businessman Jordan Orce Kamcev, is giving her testimony in the Skopje courthouse in the trial of disgraced former Special Prosecutor Katica Janeva.
Kamceva said that Janeva, directly and through intermediaries, demanded millions of euros in exchange for going easy on Kamcev in the money laundering trial she initiated against him. Ana Kamceva claimed that the case Janeva built against her husband was created with the sole purpose of extracting money from the richest Macedonian.
Kamceva described the police raids in early November 2018, when her husband was charged in Janeva’s so-called “Empire” case.
That’s when I first met Katica Janeva. I was confronted by her prosecutor Lile Stefanova who told my lawyer that we can’t touch her, she said “all power is in me and I know how to use it”. Several days later I was told to meet a lawyer named Vasil Dimiskov, the brother of judge Vesna Dimiskova, who was given the “Empire” case. During this meeting Dimiskov told me that if my husband cooperates, he will get a sweetheart deal, Kamceva testified.
She described how the lawyer offered her several options, depending on how severe the case gets, and asked for between 2 and 8 million EUR to help Orce Kamcev. “I told my husband that we don’t have a criminal case, but a problem”, Kamceva testified.
Janeva’s main intermediaries in the extortion were Bojan Jovanovski – Boki 13 and Zoran Mileski – Zoki Kiceec. Kamceva testified that she was invited to meet Bojan Jovanovski in his 1TV television, where he introduced her to Lazar Janev, Katica Janeva’s son, who had a high managerial position there.
Bojan was very close to Janeva. He knew every step of the procedure and frequently spoke with Janeva on the phone. She would give him instructions and advice, Kamceva said.
Boki 13 was filmed in Kamcev’s home, as he was leaving with a million EUR in a Louis Vuitton bag. The tapes were published by the Italian investigative paper La Verita. The Kamcev family paid 1.5 million EUR in total – the million in the bag, additional 350.000 EUR given by Kamceva to Boki 13 and 150.000 EUR which Kiceec, who was a former business partner of the Kamcev family, was asked to secure for the group. The money were paid in order to get Katica Janeva and Lile Stefanova to reduce the charges against Kamcev, or even turn him into a protected witness against other defendants.
Kamceva also testified about her meeting with Boki 13 in his home north of Skopje. She said that Janeva was present during this meeting and sternly warned Kamceva that she can start many other criminal cases against her husband. Janeva also threatened Kamceva not to discuss the meeting. “If it comes out, I will know it was you. I trust everybody else here”, Janeva said, refering to Boki 13 and Zoki Kiceec who were also present.
After we paid the money, my husband was released from detention into house arrest. I remained very afraid that Janeva will initiate new cases against him. During the course of this, I realized that Boki 13 is actually the real Special Prosecutor, given all the information he had, Kamceva added.
Like her husband, Kamceva was careful not to involve politicians from the ruling SDSM party in her testimony. Kamcev laid the blame on Boki 13 and Katica Janeva, but insisted that their close friend and political ally, the outgoing Prime Minister Zoran Zaev was not involved in the scandal. According to Kamcev, he informed Zaev of the extortion, and days later Zaev advised him to report the case to prosecutor Vilma Ruskoska, who is now leading the case against Janeva. This contradicts with the fact that Zaev was promoting Janeva to remain as Special Prosecutor and have her position made permanent months after he was informed by Kamcev about her extortion.
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