Lile Stefanova from the Special Prosecutor’s Office, who was directly charged with leading the “Empire” case against businessman Jordan Orce Kamcev, said that she is shocked by the publication of the tapes showing how Kamcev was extorted by Bojan Jovanovski – Boki 13.
Not only did I not know about these tapes, but I’m shocked. I expect that state prosecutors will investigate the entire case closely. I will cooperate with them and I will share everything I know. For the time being I can’t say more without endangering the investigation, Stefanova said.
The case was initiated by Special Prosecutor Katica Janeva in November 2018, well after she was legally banned from opening new cases, and it included allegations of money laundering against Kamcev, several other top businessmen like Cvetan Pandeleski, and former state security chief Saso Mijalkov, who was one of the primary targets of other SPO cases as well. Janeva tasked Stefanova to lead the prosecution, as she was regarded as one of the most competent prosecutors in the SPO and the brains behind many of the cases initiated by the office.
Bojan Jovanovski – Boki 13 is heard on the recording assuring Kamcev that, after the hefty payment is made, Katica Janeva won’t use the legal options she has at her disposal, and he will secure a release from house arrest. Boki 13 allegedly collected 1.5 million EUR from Kamcev in several installments, and demanded a full six million to get Janeva to drop her charges against him. Although it is widely assumed that the money were divided with Janeva, she has not been charged yet and is currently believed to be out of country.
Stefanova, who was reportedly questioned after Boki 13’s arrest, shifts the blame at the Supreme Court for the release of Jordan Kamcev from house arrest, even though the tape clearly shows Boki 13 promising to Kamcev that the SPO will sabotage its own case to let him go free.
In a series of interviews, Stefanova again made her often repeated statement that – “Janeva was signing all orders”, which is her way of clearly laying the blame at the chief Special Prosecutor.
In an interview with PressingTV, Stefanova also tries to defend Janeva, saying that she has not manifested any signs of corrupt behavior in front of her. “If they strapped me to an electric chair, I wouldn’t suspect something like this”, Stefanova told PressingTV
She added that she expects that additional tapes will surface, and pointed to what she says is a discrepancy in the time stamp of the video and the actual events in the courts. The video is dated February 20th 2019, and the decision by the Supreme Court to release Kamcev and other defendants from house arrest is from March 4th. Kamcev was in detention from November 10th 2018 until December 27th, when he was given house arrest, where he stayed until early March. In the recording, Boki 13 promises Kamcev that he will be released “by Monday or Tuesday”, which actually happened, but with a week delay, on Monday – March 4th.
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