Despite the best efforts of the Interior Ministry to assure the public that it is an effective institution when it comes to fighting small-scale crime – trotting out numerous statistics to that end – it is a public secret that the situation is much worse because most instances of petty theft never get reported.

Now, I do not mean to cast aspersions on all Bulgarian police officers, since I have met all kinds in my, admittedly infrequent, run-ins with law enforcement during the past decade: from the polite to the abrasively rude and plain disinterested.

Police officers themselves will be the first to concede that they are hardly equipped to deal with petty crime. In fact, one of the complaints by police officers during their protest rallies at the end of last year (after the demands for better pay) was for better equipment.

But it is not only the inefficiency of police to deal with crime that turns people off. Some standard operating procedures and legal provisions are beyond mind-boggling.
I had the misfortune to have my wallet stolen at the weekend, which is a pity, because I really, really liked my old wallet. Now, if my Bulgarian ID had not been in the wallet, I would not have even contemplated reporting the theft, but seeing that it was, I figured I did not have much choice.

Luckily, I was never stopped by the police during my search for the police station, or I could have easily ended up with a fine of between 50 and 300 leva in the (not unlikely) case that they asked for my ID card (Bulgarian Identity Documents Act, art. 80, para. 5). As it turns out, I will still end up paying a fine (20 to 150 leva) for failing in my duty to uphold art. 7, para. 1 of the same law: Thou shalt not damage, destroy or lose your ID. I guess having it stolen counts as misplacing it.

The best bit, however, was that I was not even able to file a report early on Sunday morning once I had located the police station. As with a lot of other paperwork, one has to submit when dealing with the public administration, filing the report involves paying a small processing fee. Via bank transfer at the bank desk in the police station, of course. Which, of course, does not work on weekends.

Seeing that I was in Bourgas at the time (I live in Sofia), with no cash or bank cards, the prospect of waiting until Monday morning was not very appealing and I never filed that report. I guess that was my little contribution towards improving the crime-fighting statistics of the Bulgarian police.

I spared myself the hassle of dealing with the police, and them the hassle of having to investigate my report, so the big picture is that everyone is happy, right?