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The judicial system in Bulgaria is favorable to drunkards and drug addicts behind the wheel, says the position of the European Center for Transport Policy on the request of Yavor Baharov’s lawyers to cancel the texts related to the tests of drivers for alcohol and drugs .
The Bulgarian judicial system cannot be described as perfect. The application of the law creates a number of paradoxes, sometimes even absurd exceptions, and the rights of the individual cannot always be guaranteed. The European Center for Transport Policy pointed out a similar legal problem in April, drawing the attention of the Attorney General and the Ministry of Justice to some serious shortcomings in the investigation of traffic accidents. Among them is the lack of opportunity for each of the parties to be represented in the most objective way possible in the judicial process, due to the impossibility of assigning expert opinions to people who are not registered in the judicial records. It has been a long time since this proposal for the creation of an interministerial working group was presented, and the interest of the Prosecutor’s Office and the Ministry of Justice remains negligible in these matters.
One of the most important legal cases that directly affects road safety is the procedure to establish the presence of alcohol and drugs and whether a driver has been driving under their influence. The imperfections in the process of determining whether someone has used or not are significant and this allows systemic offenders to continue driving their cars, sometimes leading to the death of innocent people. Such an illustrative example is the accident on April 19 this year, in which television host Milen Tsvetkov died.
In another similar case in 2018, presenter Milena Milotinova was injured. In this traffic accident, the driver entered the oncoming vehicle and collided with the road vehicle in which he was driving head-on. In this particular case, the at-fault driver did not use drugs or alcohol, but was under the influence of drugs that have a negative effect on the driver’s reactions and are contraindicated for use while driving. Two years after the incident, the investigation continues.
Another shocking case this year was the arrest of actor Yavor Baharov, who was driving under the influence of drugs. He was sentenced to one year of effective sentence. Now the actor’s lawyers are trying to persuade the SAC to repeal some texts of the ordinance to establish the use of alcohol and drugs, which is used by the Ministry of the Interior.
This is a dangerous tendency to defy rules and regulations by drivers who have been shown to consistently violate the rules. This trend teaches everyone that breaking the rules of the road is a forgivable mistake, which with legal tricks will allow them to avoid the punishment that should, in principle, discipline them.
The problem of drunk and drugged drivers is not just a problem of the Bulgarian judicial system, it is a global problem and it is no coincidence that one of the EU’s priorities is the fight against these drivers. The example of Milen Tsvetkov and Milena Milotinova clearly shows how when a mistake is not punished in time, it leads to death or serious consequences for the victims, who still survived a serious traffic accident.
Rather, the European Center for Transport Policy should encourage the Bulgarian court not to be lenient with such acts of flagrant violation of the law. At the same time, our experts would like once again to convene a dialogue of road safety experts with the participation of the Attorney General, the Minister of Justice, the National Assembly and all interested parties in order to create a set of legal documents that do not they will allow the perpetrators. guides so easy to slide. Because if this time the incident came down to someone detained for wandering the road, otherwise it could have ended with the death of an innocent. Do we have to wait for this to happen again to take appropriate action?
Sofia, Bulgaria
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