Controversial businessman Plamen Galev, who was arrested for having allegedly intimidated a journalist, will remain under arrest, Sofia City Court decided on December 12, Bulgarian news agency BTA reported.

The court hearing was conducted behind closed doors since police had used wire-taps in the course of the investigation against Galev. The latter, together with his business partner Angel Hristov, are commonly referred to in Bulgarian media as the "Galevi brothers" from the small souther town of Doupnitsa, although they are not related.

Galev's lawyer said that he would not appeal the country's decision which means that Galev will remain under custody for the time being and would not be ste on bail.

Galev was detained by the police for 72 hours on December 5 2008 shortly after he was declared as "wanted" by the police for having assaulted a journalist from his home town of Doupnitsa.

On December 5 2008, the Interior Ministry published a statement saying that it was "searching for Plamen Galev and Krassimir Okov for having committed a severe criminal offence - "pressuring a journalist".

The journalist in question was Lidia Popova, the Doupnitsa correspondent of Bulgarian-language Strouma daily, based in Blagoevgrad. Popova had filed a court claim against one of Galev's bodyguards Georgi Gradevski, who had allegedly beaten her son at a night club. Allegedly, Galev had tried to convince Popova to withdraw her claim against Gradevski.

Hers have been just one of many media reports, including of foreign media, on Galevi brothers and their alleged domination in Doupnitsa and how the whole town was dependent on their will.

The Interior Ministry said that Gradevski has already been detained, but said only that he had committed a brutal and cynical crime without saying what in particular. Next to that an investigation was launched into the work of Doupnitsa police officers in relation to the night club incident. 

Meanwhile people in Doupnitsa have been organising petitions in support of Galev. The media said that a petition called "Doupnitsa is not afraid and supports Plamen Galev who has done a lot for the town" has gathered about 11 000 signatures. The petition has the entire support of the local city hall. The Galevi brothers are on the consultancy council appointed to give advises to the mayor.

According to Angel Hristov, Galev's business partner, the latter had voluntarily went to the police after learning the news about his upcoming arrest. Hristov also said that Popova had asked money from them in order to stop writing reports about their activity, which she denied. Another thing Hristov claimed was that Galev has been receiving text messages on his mobile phones warning him about police operations against their business. 

One such operation took place on October 15 2008 when one of the most large-scale operations of interior Ministry and the National Investigative Service (NIS)  was launched in Doupnitsa. The ministry said that the operations was to "gather additional evidence relating to financial and tax crimes".

The ministry did not reveal the target of all these special efforts or what had triggered this level of co-operation among Bulgaria's crime-busting organisations, but said that people with initials PG and AH were supposed to appear for questioning, but had gone missing.

Hours after the operation, the Interior Ministry said that the Galevi brothers were summoned for questioning but went missing. Galev was quoted by private broadcaster bTV as saying that they had never been summoned by the police and that was why they decided to appear personally at the NIS.
They were simply questioned and set free.

A day later, they appeared appeared on private television station Nova Televiziya to reveal a police statement that nothing incriminating had been found during the search of their houses in Doupnitsa. The statement, according to NIS, was classified information, hence the Galevi brothers will have to answer for their actions. Continuing its crime-fighting efforts, the NIS asked for the details of all Nova Televiziya journalists who had worked on the TV show featuring the Galevi brothers.