Fugitive Bulgarian drug lord Evelin Banev, needed in a number of European international locations, surrendered to regulation enforcement authorities early Monday, the inside ministry stated.
The previous wrestler — dubbed Bulgaria’s “cocaine king” — had been sought since 2018. Ukrainian authorities caught him in Kyiv in September 2021 however refused to extradite him on the grounds that he had acquired Ukrainian nationality.
His whereabouts had been unknown since then.
“I can verify that round 7:30 am this morning Evelin Banev ‘Brendo’, who has been declared internationally needed, surrendered voluntarily. Police will switch him to jail authorities,” inside ministry spokesman Mitko Dimitrov informed AFP.
An internet video uploaded on social media by the flagman.bg information web site confirmed Banev and his lawyer Petar Zafirov strolling to the central jail within the Bulgarian capital metropolis of Sofia.
DIMITAR KYOSEMARLIEV/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
“Mr. Banev exhibits as much as serve a punishment that has been imposed on him in keeping with a sentence that is last,” Zafirov informed the reporter.
Banev, 59, sporting a gray baseball cap, solely stated “In fact” when the reporter requested him if he realized what he was doing.
Banev fled after being sentenced in 2013 in Bulgaria to seven-and-a-half years in jail for cash laundering. The sentence was lowered to 6 years on enchantment.
Interpol
After he was sentenced, his then 10-year-old daughter was kidnapped exterior her home within the capital Sofia, the BBC reported on the time. She was ultimately freed and left close to a police station in Sofia, Sky Information reported.
Banev has been the topic of an Interpol purple discover since 2013.
Banev was additionally needed by Romania the place he was sentenced in absentia to ten-and-a-half years for drug trafficking.
In late 2017, he was additionally sentenced to twenty years in jail in Italy for smuggling as much as 40 tons of cocaine from Latin America between 2004 and 2007 and supplying the ‘Ndrangheta mafia.
In 2022, a former Bulgarian tennis participant with alleged ties to Banev was discovered responsible of cash laundering in Switzerland, the BBC reported. Prosecutors stated that Elena Pampoulova, who labored at Credit score Suisse, had constructed a casual monetary relationship with Banev and he or she allegedly collected baggage “full of money” from folks identified to the wrestler. Pampoulova died final yr on the age of fifty.
