Five months after the "Petrohan" tragedy, the prosecutor's office announced that it is removing the police guard from the former chalet.
The state prosecution added that the investigation into the death of the five men and the child is at a stage where the need for security in the area is no longer needed. A check by bTV yesterday found that there is still a police patrol at the scene.
According to the team, no new orders have been given and they will remain there until the end of the week. A bTV team went to the scene this morning.
Our team saw that there was a police car with two officers from the Sofia Directorate of Internal Affairs guarding the site.
In early February, the bodies of three people were found near the “Petrohan“ hut. The case became even more mysterious when a week later, under Okolchitsa Peak, the bodies of three more people were found.
The perimeter is currently cordoned off to the entrance to the hut, but at first it reached all the way to the main road of the “Petrohan“ pass. Police patrols were stationed there and no one could pass, except for people who have properties in the area.
The police tape has already been removed. However, a herd of buffaloes causes problems for the police officers, and when the animals enter the property, the tape is raised.
What is striking is that the trees around are full of signs. They say that the entry of outsiders is prohibited, that there is an electric fence, that anyone who tries to enter will be harmed, and that there is a guard dog.
However, the most impressive thing is this large white sign, on which is written the name of the organization “National Agency for the Control of Protected Areas“.
It is also stated that this is a base for rangers and mountain patrols, that the entry of outsiders is strictly prohibited, and that there is 24-hour security. It is also claimed that this is a protected area in the Pre-Balkan and Western Stara Planina Mountains.
The official version is that Ivaylo Ivanov, Decho Vassilev and Plamen Stattev - people from Ivaylo Kalushev's group - committed suicide here.
Under Okolchitsa Peak - not by a policeman, but by a man who has a family property on the Balkan ridge, the camper in which Ivaylo Kalushev, 22-year-old Nikolay Zlatkov and 15-year-old Aleksandar Makulev were found shot dead.
The official version is that the three who were found on “Petrohan“ committed suicide. And at Okolchitsa Peak, there are two murders and one suicide.
What are the real motives - it is not clear yet.
A week ago, Interior Minister Ivan Demerdzhiev said on national television that there are many questions. According to him, the communication between the prosecutor's office and the police is not good enough. The investigating police officers do not know what the prosecutor's office's conclusions are.
The questions are also related to where these people received funds from, who their donors were, how these funds were used and how this ranger group was allowed to inhabit and guard this territory - obviously with the assistance of state institutions.
What became clear during the investigation is that the group had a lot of weapons and modern equipment.
The hut still bears the traces of the fire.
Public opinion remains strongly divided. Many believe, including the mothers of two of the deceased, that this is a case of murder and external interference.
We expect the investigators to say what exactly happened, and the prosecutor's office to issue an official statement, because since the beginning of March there has been no official information on the "Petrohan" case.
According to criminalist Ivan Savov, the lifting of the security means precisely that there is nothing more to be seized from the scene.
Everything that the investigators have assessed that can be examined, seized and used as evidence has already been collected.
According to the expert, is it not normal for this to last so long - five months?
“The procedural and investigative actions were completed much earlier. Rather, throughout this time, the investigators did not want citizens to have free access to the place, because it was possible for people who were not part of the investigation to draw additional conclusions“, commented Ivan Savov.
“The case is truly unprecedented in Bulgaria. And as such, it is causing serious confusion, including among the investigative authorities. My personal opinion, which I have stated many times in various media outlets and which I continue to stand by, is that this is not a matter of suicide. We are talking about a pure criminal offense – the murder of six people“, said Ivan Savov.
“The property was not released for half a year. In my practice, I have participated in the investigation of quite serious crimes, including contract killings. Even in cases related to the underground, which are well known to the public, the crime scene was released literally after a day or two. And, believe me, they were no less socially significant than this case. The problem here is that the investigating authorities seem unprepared for such a situation. If my assumption is correct and it is a criminal offense committed by people who came specifically to kill the six, it is very likely that the investigators were concerned that additional information would not come out if the property was released earlier. After all, this is the crime scene“, the expert commented.
“To be honest, they could not convincingly prove in any way – neither to the public, nor to people who understand such investigations – that it was three suicides, two murders and another suicide. Instead, a sensational version was presented, in the style of the 1990s tabloids - one that was intended to shock the public and divert public attention. Including allegations of a pedophile sect and the like. For better or worse, none of these allegations were proven categorically“, Ivan Savov pointed out.
“The only thing we can say for sure is that this was a heavily guarded facility. They can be seen even on publicly available geolocation platforms – one just needs to virtually explore the area“, he said.
The main witness - the person who discovered the bodies - was allowed to leave the country.
“To me, this means that for some reason this person should not be here. And this further complicates the case. Too many things are sewn together with white threads. I understand that the Bulgarian services do not have a tradition of explaining everything to the public. To a certain extent, I understand them - not all information should be public. But in this case, almost nothing officially announced by the prosecutor's office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs inspires confidence and does not correspond to what people saw and learned. The security camera recordings that were published were clippings - a few seconds or up to a minute. Instead of clarifying the circumstances, they tied them up even more, because new and new details are constantly being discovered in them,“ commented the criminalist.
“I had the opportunity to see the forensic medical examination of one of the persons found in the camper. Only three pages, prepared extremely pro forma. I have seen many forensic medical examinations and autopsy protocols. Three pages are extremely insufficient. One page is just the introduction, one is the conclusion, and the actual research part - the description of the body's condition - fits into about one page. This is unusually small. If you want to blurt something out, you just do it pro forma so that there is some document. That's what I saw," Savov pointed out.