Zlatomir Ivanov, known as Bareta, has asked the Sofia City Court to be released from custody to become a polling station representative for election candidate Ivaylo Drazhev, Bulgarian daily Dnevnik said on June 25 2009.

Ivanov has been charged with leading an organised crime group for the distribution of drugs and prosecutors are still investigating his alleged involvement in the murders of Georgi Ivanov and Nikova Natsev, as well as the attempted murders of Anton Miltenov, Radoslav Velkov and Dimitar Voutchev, Dnevnik said.

Drazhev, meanwhile, himself has been involved in a court case that has dragged on for the past 11 years, in which he has been accused of causing a fatal car accident that caused the death of two people.

Yuliy Abadjiev, leader of the Group of Bulgarian Patriots, the party for which Drazhev is a local candidate in Bourgas for the parliament elections, announced that Ivanov did not have the support of the party, and he asked for the release request by Ivanov to be revoked.

According to Abadjiev, the registration of Ivanov as representative for one of his party's election candidates had happened without the party's knowledge and consent.

Bulgaria's election law, however, says that the registration of a polling station representative is handled by the election candidate and does not require the agreement of the party's leadership. The Central Election Commission said that the regional election commission did not have any reason to void the registration of Ivanov as polling station representative, Dnevnik said.

A day earlier, the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) ruled that Drazhev had systematically abused his right to protection. Drazhev has been accused of causing an accident in 1998 in which two people died and another was left disabled. After 11 years, the court has is yet to be concluded, not even in first instance. That was the second fatal accident that Drazhev stands accused of, Dnevnik said.

In its ruling, the SJC said that Drazhev had abused the rights given by the Penal Procedure Code provided, repeatedly changing his lawyers and, ultimately, appointing a lawyer with in extremely poor health. In addition to systematically abusing his rights, Drazhev had also used other loopholes in the law that allow defendants and their lawyers to effectively block the progress of criminal cases, the SJC said.