Convicted Bulgarians face fresh charges

BY PETRINA KYOBUTUNGI AND JOB BWIRE  

Three of the four Bulgarians who were recently convicted by Buganda road court for forging Stanbic Bank ATM cards have been charged in Nakawa magistrate’s court.

 Ivan Ganchev, Milen Kartaski and Adrian Dimitrov were on Wednesday arraigned before the Nakawa chief magistrate, Joy Kabaje to answer more charges of forgery.

The trio is charged with 35 separate counts of forging Stanbic Bank customers ATM cards and another count of conspiracy to commit the offence.

However, their case was adjourned after the court heard that a witness who was supposed to testify against the convicts fell sick after he got involved in a motor accident.

Court heard that sergeant    Kenneth Bagonza a police detective attached to the Regional CID headquarters was bedridden for cross examination by the defence lawyer.

Prosecution alleges that on August 30, 2012 while in Kampala, the accused Bulgarians (now convicts), all business men and residents of Naalya estates, tried to defraud over 35 Stanbic Bank customers through the use of fake ATM cards at Nateete branch.

They are said to have tried to fix a schemer and a card reader into the ATM machine with the intention of illegally withdrawing money, before they were eventually caught.

The three accused are among the four who were recently convicted and sentenced to 20 and 10 years imprisonment by the Buganda Road court to which ruling the convicts have appealed against.

The trio were initially sentenced to serve 20 years while the forth convict, Anton Ivanov (not charged at Nakawa court) was sentenced to 10 years by Buganda road court magistrate Julius Borore.

The case was adjourned to January 30 for further cross examination of witnesses.