CEDH · CASELAW;JUDGMENTS;CHAMBER;ENG — 4 octobre 2022

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border:0.75pt solid #949494; padding:1.02pt 5.03pt; vertical-align:top } .s4043161D { width:24.14%; border:0.75pt solid #949494; padding:1.02pt 5.03pt; vertical-align:top } .sA0BDD10A { width:17.24%; border:0.75pt solid #949494; padding:1.02pt 5.03pt; vertical-align:top }   FOURTH SECTION CASE OF PAKETOVA AND OTHERS v. BULGARIA (Applications nos. 17808/19 and 36972/19)     JUDGMENT   Art 14 (+ Art 8) • Discrimination • Positive obligations • Private and family life • Home • Authorities’ omissions resulting in ethnic Roma being driven away from their homes after anti-Roma protests and not being able to return • Officials’ repeated public display of unacceptance of the Roma and opposition to their return, reinforcing applicants’ legitimate fear for their safety and representing a real obstacle to their peaceful return • Disadvantaged and vulnerable position of Roma and need for their special protection • Failure to provide measures of special protection and information on assistance   STRASBOURG 4 October 2022 FINAL   04/01/2023   This judgment has become final under Article 44 § 2 of the Convention. It may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of Paketova and Others v. Bulgaria, The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting as a Chamber composed of:   Gabriele Kucsko-Stadlmayer , President,   Faris Vehabović ,   Iulia Antoanella Motoc ,   Yonko Grozev ,   Pere Pastor Vilanova ,   Jolien Schukking ,   Ana Maria Guerra Martins , judges, and Ilse Freiwirth, Deputy Section Registrar, Having regard to: the applications (nos.   17808/19 and 36972/19) against the Republic of Bulgaria lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by the fifty-six Bulgarian nationals listed in the appendix (“the applicants”), respectively on 1 April 2019 (by the first to the fifty-fifth applicants) and on 1 July 2019 (by the applicant in application no. 36972/19); the decision to give notice to the Bulgarian Government (“the Government”) of the complaints under Articles 3 and 8 and Articles 13 and 14 in conjunction with the former two provisions, and to declare inadmissible the remainder of the applications; the decision to give priority to the applications (Rule 41 of the Rules of Court); the decision to reject the request for withdrawal from the case of judge Grozev, submitted by the Government; the decision to indicate an interim measure to the Government under Rule   39 of the Rules of Court; the observations submitted by the Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicants; the comments submitted by the non-governmental organisation the European Roma Rights Centre, which was granted leave to intervene by the President of the Section; Having deliberated in private on 13 September 2022, Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date: INTRODUCTION 1.     The case concerns the applicants’ complaints that they had been forced to leave their homes and prevented from returning subsequently, and that the authorities had refused them protection in an environment of racially based hostility. The applicants relied on Articles 3, 8, 13 and 14 of the Convention. THE FACTS 2.     The applicants were born on the dates indicated in the appended table. They are members of several families of Roma origin. At the time of the events they lived in Voyvodinovo, a village in Maritsa municipality, Plovdiv region. The applicants were represented by Mr K. Kanev, chairperson of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, a non ‑ governmental organisation based in Sofia. On 15 January 2016 the then President of the Fifth Section gave Mr   Kanev leave to represent the applicants in all pending and future cases in which he had been appointed to personally act as their representative (Rule   36 § 4 (a)   in fine   of the Rules of Court). 3.     The Government were represented by their Agent, Ms R. Nikolova of the Ministry of Justice. 4 .     The facts of the case, which have received widespread media coverage, may be summarised as follows. THE EVENTS ON 6 JANUARY 2019 5 .     On 6 January 2019 the thirty-first applicant was involved in a physical fight in a street in Voyvodinovo, as a result of which a non-Roma member of the military sustained injuries and was taken to hospital. The thirty-first applicant and his brother were immediately arrested, criminally charged in connection with the brawl, held continuously in detention until April 2019 and were given suspended prison sentences at the end of the judicial proceedings. 6 .     According to the applicants, at about 6 p.m. on 6 January 2019 angry members of the local population started gathering in the village to protest against the incident. Followers of radical extremist groups from Plovdiv joined them. The protesters walked around the village streets shouting anti-Roma slogans and threats of physical violence. Police forces arrived from Plovdiv in order to maintain public order. At about 10 p.m. the mayor of Voyvodinovo (also subsequently referred to as “the village mayor”) arrived in the Roma neighbourhood and told all the inhabitants there to leave immediately. Fearing for their safety, the majority of them (about a hundred Roma) left without delay the same night, by taxi or in friends’ cars; the few who remained hid in the houses overnight and left the following day. 7 .     According to a district police report of 29 January 2020, addressed to the head of the Plovdiv regional police directorate and prepared in the context of providing information for the purposes of the present application before the Court, immediately after the incident on 6 January 2019 the population of Voyvodinovo organised a series of recurrent protests. They lasted for about two weeks (see paragraphs 16-18 below) and were held in the street where the perpetrators had lived along with other Roma inhabitants. The police were present on 7 January 2019 during the first protest in the village. The Roma houses that had been abandoned on the evening of 6 January 2019 remained empty that day and for the following few days. 8 .     According to the Government the protests were directed against the Roma inhabitants of the village. The police had been tipped off that the non-Roma majority wished to drive the Roma away from the area and demolish their houses since they considered that they had been built unlawfully. In response to this, there had been a permanent police presence during the period when the protests were taking place, and the police had ensured public order and traffic safety, and not allowed any damage to be done to private property. 9 .     The protests received widespread media coverage and video-footage was broadcast by several television stations. VISIT BY THE DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER TO VOYVODINOVO ON 8 JANUARY 2019 10 .     On 8 January 2019 the then Deputy Prime Minister overseeing public order and safety, who was also Minister of Defence, arrived in the village. Having first stopped at the hospital to see the member of the military injured on 6 January 2019, he visited the Roma settlement, accompanied by the village mayor, the mayor of Maritsa municipality (also referred to below as “the municipal mayor”) and high-ranking police officials. The daily newspaper Sega reported that they ordered immediate measures to be taken, namely checks to be carried out on all the houses in the Roma neighbourhood. 11 .     The then Deputy Prime Minister also stated, as reported by Karlovo TV, as follows: “The municipal authorities have started checking the buildings, all of which are absolutely illegal, reports are being drawn up in that connection, and they will be followed by mayoral orders before demolition begins; those unfit for usage will be knocked down immediately.” He was reported by Sega to have said the same day that “all unlawfully built houses in the Roma neighbourhood in Voyvodinovo will be demolished”. 12 .     He also stated, as broadcast on national television on the same day, and further cited by several other media in the following days, that “Gypsies in Bulgaria have become tremendously brazen. A few days ago, they beat up a policeman, now a member of the military. This cannot continue and the tolerance of Bulgarian society has run out.” 13.     He also reportedly stated that immediate measures would be taken for dealing with the problems with the Roma population. He also stated on the same day, in a video-recording by regional media Plovdiv Press which is available online, and reported by Sega , as follows: “There is one part of the population – I do not know why they call them Roma, are there any Romans around?! – which is a totally lost cause, which does not wish to integrate, to work, to take the interests of others into account, does not respect others’ life and health, and acts as it pleases. And that is owing to the fact that this part of the population, the majority of this gypsy population, lives in illegal ghettos, consumes electricity illegally, considers that they do not need to accept anybody and in practice they become a marginalised group in society living by the laws of the jungle.” 14.     In response to a question put by a journalist about what he thought of the protesters, the then Deputy Prime Minister said “It is their right to protest. I would call on them to avoid taking justice in their own hands. There are law-enforcement bodies and, as we see, they do their work well.” In response to a question about where all the inhabitants of the Roma neighbourhood would go if their houses were suddenly demolished, he was cited as replying “Take them to your place.” INSPECTION OF THE ROMA HOUSES AND ORDERS FOR THE DEMOLITION OF UNSAFE BUILDINGS OF 8 JANUARY 2019 15 .     On 8 January 2019 the ad interim municipal mayor appointed a commission of building inspection officials, which drew up a record establishing that fifteen buildings in the Roma neighbourhood posed a danger to their inhabitants and were unfit for use and recommending that they be demolished. On 9   January 2019 the ad interim municipal mayor issued four orders for the demolition of those buildings, which were knocked down in the following couple of days. It would appear that the buildings in question were mostly auxiliary sheds not used as main housing premises. PROTESTS BY THE LOCAL POPULATION AGAINST THE ROMA INHABITANTS OF THE VILLAGE 16 .     Protests, which had started on the evening of 6 January 2019, continued in the following days (see paragraph 7 above). Many of the protests were recorded and broadcast on television and continue to be available on YouTube. 17 .     On 8 January 2019 protesters called Roma “carrion” ( мърши ) and “pikeys” ( мангали ). Posters were put up bearing the slogan: “This is Bulgaria, not Gypsyland ( Тук е България, а не Цигания )”. Some of those interviewed by the media openly spoke about how unacceptable the Roma way of life was and urged the Bulgarian population to unite and take things in their own hands if the authorities failed to do so. 18 .     On 11 January 2019, during the largest march on the streets of Voyvodinovo, protesters, who included many football fans from other cities, chanted repeatedly throughout the evening: “Eeo, eeo, eeo! Calling myself Bulgarian is my greatest joy!” A general addressed the crowd with the words: “Let us say no to the Gypsy iniquity! With Bulgarian flags and the red beret.” 19.     On 11 January 2019 a group of academics published an open letter to the Bulgarian Prime Minister in support of the Deputy Prime Minister’s statements against the Roma, in view of the “increasingly insolent atrocities of the Gypsy citizens”. PUBLIC STATEMENTS BY OFFICIALS IN RELATION TO THE DWELLINGS IN THE ROMA NEIGHBOURHOOD 20 .     On 9 January 2019 the deputy municipal mayor stated publicly, as filmed and broadcast by Bulgarian news agency BTA: “We are continuing. The next step is to demolish the big buildings and to clear the land. For every building there should be a demolition order, which should be personally delivered or placed visibly on the house. We are waiting until the time-limit for appeal expires, and we are continuing until the area is 100% clean.” 21 .     On 10 January 2019 the village mayor stated on the television channel OnAir, which was then also reported by other media: “Public opinion is unanimous: there is no coming back [for the Roma]. Not one house will remain.” 22 .     On 11 January 2019 the village mayor stated to the national television channel bTV: “After clearing the land, it will be placed on a municipal list for sale. If no one is interested, it will be used as a park.” FURTHER ORDERS FOR THE DEMOLITION OF HOUSES IN THE ROMA NEIGHBOURHOOD 23 .     On 16 January 2019 the municipal mayor issued seventeen orders for the demolition of unlawful buildings under section 225a(1) of the 2001 Act (see paragraph 100 below). The orders referred to the findings in the record of 8 January 2019 (see paragraph 15 above) and were based on decisions ( констативни актове ) by the building inspection officials of 8 January 2019. The overseeing of the demolition was delegated to the village mayor. Among the buildings identified for demolition were the houses of the applicants. 24.     The applicants brought judicial review proceedings before the Plovdiv Administrative Court challenging the orders. Seventeen administrative cases were opened by that court. THE APPLICANTS’ REQUEST FOR PROTECTION TO RETURN TO THEIR HOUSES AND THEIR ATTEMPTED RETURN ON 9   FEBRUARY 2019 25 .     On 1 February 2019 thirty-four of the applicants wrote to the Plovdiv regional directorate of the Ministry of the Interior, asking the police to provide them with protection so they could return to their homes in Voyvodinovo. Specifically, they stated that they lived with their families in Voyvodinovo and that the whole Roma community living in the Roma neighbourhood of the village had been forced to leave on 6 January 2019 as a result of threats of physical violence directed at them. Ever since, they had been living at relatives’ homes, squatting in empty buildings or even sleeping on the street. 26 .     The thirty-four applicants emphasised that the situation was intolerable in the long term, as their relatives did not have much space themselves, their children could not attend school and they had left their belongings behind unattended in their houses. They expressed their intention to return to their homes, but stated that they were afraid of the threats against them which had been voiced publicly by private individuals. Those threats had started on 6 January 2019 and had continued to that day. They reiterated their request for urgent and effective action by the police so the families could safely return to their homes. 27 .     Without providing further details, the applicants submitted to the Court that shortly after their request, the police had contacted some of them by phone, as well as some non-governmental organisations, in an attempt to dissuade them from returning. 28.     In the morning of 9 February 2019, some inhabitants of the Roma neighbourhood in Voyvodinovo returned to it. According to the applicants, there were about forty of them, while the Government submitted that there were no more than twenty. 29 .     According to the applicants, they returned at around 9.30 a.m. and the Roma neighbourhood was empty. Sometime later a police car arrived and two police officers subjected them to an identity check. Then some more police arrived together with a senior officer who ordered the police to prevent the Roma from entering their houses, claiming that the buildings were dangerous. The village mayor arrived after the police and categorically refused to let the Roma enter their houses. Protesters arrived in the Roma neighbourhood about two hours after the forty or so applicants. 30 .     As recorded in an operational action plan ( план разстановка ) drawn up by the police on the same day in connection with these events, the police were informed that a civic protest had been organised against the return of the Roma population to their houses, which it had been declared in the meantime had been built illegally. The action plan’s stated aims were: ensuring public order and collecting information about the organisers’ and the participants’ profiles and whether their intentions included breaching public order, committing offences or carrying out provocative actions aimed at third parties, and undertaking measures to prevent this. The duties of the police included: identifying and apprehending individuals who had committed offences prior to, during and following the end of the event; preventing and terminating all kinds of antisocial and unlawful behaviour; identifying suspicious individuals; and resorting to coercive measures, physical force or use of arms only in situations provided for in the Ministry of the Interior Act. 31 .     The report referred to in paragraph 7 above stated that the police had identified the situation as one of high risk in terms of breaches of public order, basing their assessment on the previous protest of 6   January 2019 which had been held following a serious criminal act by Roma individuals. The regional police director had issued an order on 9 February 2019, which, together with the operational action plan, aimed to ensure public order and safety (see paragraphs 30 above and 48 below). The police had blocked the access of the group of protesters to the Roma houses and had thus prevented breaches of public order without using physical force. 32 .     Once the village mayor arrived on the scene, the applicants who had returned had a long and animated conversation with him in the street in front of their houses. As could be seen in a video-recording of that encounter, filmed by a national media outlet ( Monitor ), he told them that they could enter their houses once they had shown him documents proving ownership. He added that the village did not want them there, that they had done nothing but cause damage in the years they had lived there, and that he could do nothing to stop the people who did not want to see them return. 33.     At the end of the conversation, the applicants in question left in a bus, provided by the village mayor and apparently driven by him personally (see paragraph   48 below), which took them to the Roma neighbourhood in Plovdiv. The police escorted the bus. 34 .     The events on 9 February 2019 were widely covered in the media, which reported a strong police presence in Voyvodinovo as a result of tension between the two communities, sparked by the return of the Roma against whom the local population protested, including by attempting to storm the Roma neighbourhood. It was also reported that the village mayor had driven the Roma away on a bus after the local population had marched towards the Roma neighbourhood and attempted to break the police blockade. The situation had been triggered by the cruelty of two Roma the previous month who had attacked and beaten a member of the military, in response to which the village population had rioted. The Deputy Prime Minister had personally visited the village and the municipality had started to demolish the unlawful buildings. The inhabitants of those houses had then left the village voluntarily. 35.     On 12 February 2019 Bulgarian National Television reported, broadcasting related video, that about 300 people living in Voyvodinovo had asked the municipal authorities that day not to allow the Roma to return and had warned that, if that were to happen, the demonstrations would resume. The municipal and village mayors assured them that the Roma could not return because judicial proceedings were pending (see paragraph 37 below). SUBSEQUENT PUBLIC STATEMENTS BY OFFICIALS 36 .     On 10 February 2019 the deputy municipal mayor was reported by Monitor to have said: “On Monday we will declare their houses too dangerous to use, so that they do not return again.” On the same day the village mayor was reported by 24 Hours to have said that the return of the Roma was a provocation orchestrated by human rights organisations. 37 .     On 12 February 2019 the deputy municipal mayor stated on Bulgarian National Television: “The Roma cannot return here to Voyvodinovo, because there are ongoing judicial proceedings and the law states that where that is the case it is for the court to decide on the matter. We are waiting for the court to deliver its decision.” 38 .     On 25 April 2019 the village mayor stated on Darik Radio: “Whatever the court decides, it is up to the people of the village, and they do not want them to return, so there will be a lot of trouble in the future if this is somehow allowed to happen... They have so far lived at the expense of society. Now it is time that Bulgaria shakes them off and they leave. Yes, they will suffer, but they will go in the right direction. If they don’t like it, they can find another place to live. I said that I would pay their transport costs from Bulgaria to wherever they decide [to go].” ADMINISTRATIVE JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS AIMED AT ALLOWING THE APPLICANTS TO RETURN TO THEIR HOMES The applicants’ requests 39 .     On 14 February 2019 seven of the applicants brought judicial proceedings under Article 250 of the Code of Administrative Procedure (see paragraph 88 below) by submitting seventeen separate claims in respect of themselves and their families. 40.     They submitted that on 6 January 2019 they had been made to leave their houses, where some of them had lived for thirty years, after threats against their and their families’ safety had been made at a protest following a criminal incident in the village of Voyvodinovo earlier on the same day. On 16 January 2019 the municipal mayor had issued orders for the demolition of the houses as having been built unlawfully (see paragraph 23 above). 41 .     The seven applicants stated that they had returned to the village on 9   February 2019 with the intention of going back to their houses, where they had left most of their belongings following the hasty departure on the evening of 6 January 2019. However, both the police and the village mayor had told them that they could not return to their houses. The reason they had been given was that, as judicial administrative proceedings were ongoing, only once they had ended in favour of the applicants could they occupy their homes again (see paragraph 100 below). If the courts found against them, however, the houses were going to be demolished. The applicants who had returned to the village had asked where they were supposed to live in the meantime and the mayor had replied that it was not his concern. 42 .     The applicants who had returned to the village had asked about the legal grounds for preventing their return to their homes, but they were not given any. Instead, the mayor had told them that the people of the village did not want the Roma there (see paragraph   32 above). The police had lined up, forming a barrier, thus blocking those applicants’ access to their houses. 43 .     Referring to the above situation, the seven applicants requested the court to order the village mayor and the police to cease without delay any and all actions resulting in blocking their and their families’ access to their homes, in so far as those actions were not based on an administrative decision or did not stem from the law. Court decisions at first instance 44 .     Seventeen cases were opened by the Plovdiv Administrative Court under Article 250 of the Code of Administrative Procedure (see paragraph 39 above). In seventeen rulings ( определения ) of 21 February 2019 different formations of that court found the requests inadmissible. In reaching its conclusions the court observed, inter alia , as follows. 45 .     The municipal mayor had issued orders on 16 January 2019 for the demolition of unlawfully built houses (see paragraph 23 above), including the claimants’. Upon appeals by the claimants, the proceedings were pending before the Plovdiv Administrative Court. The municipal mayor’s orders were not immediately enforceable. 46 .     In the proceedings brought by the claimants, they had alleged in particular that physical actions by the village mayor and the police had prevented them from returning to their homes. Protection under the said legal provision (see paragraph 88 below) could be provided in situations in which officials’ actions did not stem from an administrative act or the law. The protection that could be provided was an order for the immediate and unconditional ceasing of such actions. Such actions however had to be taking place at the time when protection was being sought. Protection could not be provided when such actions had ceased in the meantime. 47 .     According to the regional police directorate, the police had been tipped off at 11.08 a.m. on the morning of 9 February 2019 via an emergency telephone line that “about twenty gypsies had turned up in the Roma neighbourhood of Voyvodinovo, had lit a fire and had been warming themselves around it. About an hour later, some sixty to seventy people had arrived in the Roma neighbourhood and had gathered at around 60 metres away from the gypsies.” 48 .     According to the police, they had identified the situation as one of high risk in terms of breaches of public order, basing their assessment on the previous protests of 6   January 2019 which had been held following a serious criminal act by Roma individuals (see paragraph 7 above). The regional police director had issued an order on 9 February 2019 which, together with an operational action plan (see paragraph 30 above), had been aimed at ensuring public order and safety. The police had blocked the protesters’ access to the Roma houses, thus preventing breaches of public order without using physical force. The Roma had been driven away by the village mayor in a bus just after 3 p.m. when everything had settled down. 49 .     According to the village mayor, he had been alerted on the morning of 9   February 2019 that a group of Roma had returned to their neighbourhood and were standing next to their houses. When he had arrived on the scene at around noon, he had found about a hundred persons gathered next to the church on the main road and the police blocking their access to the unlawfully built houses. He had spoken with both groups there. He had told the protesters to keep calm and not to take justice into their own hands. He had invited the Roma to collect whatever they could and to leave as quickly as possible. The reason was that he could not guarantee their life, health and safety, in view of the unpredictable conduct of the protesters, whose numbers were growing. In the words of the mayor, neither he nor the police had prevented in any way the return of the Roma to their houses; on the contrary, the police had been preventing the protesters from reaching the houses. 50 .     The court then observed that, following its own order to that effect, police had visited the Roma neighbourhood between 9 and 10 a.m. on 20   February 2019, and had established that the houses were uninhabited. Nothing suggested that the claimants, who had not been present that day, were being prevented by anybody from returning to their houses. 51.     The court concluded that, as the police had been ensuring public order on 9 February 2019 on the basis of the law and the police director’s order, and their duties had not included preventing individuals from entering their own houses, they could not be held accountable under Article 250 of the Code of Administrative Procedure. 52.     Furthermore, as could be seen from the explanations of the village mayor, on 9 February 2019 he too, like the police, had been preventing the protestors from reaching the Roma who had been standing next to the unlawfully built houses on municipal land. He had acted in accordance with his legal obligations and responsibilities stemming from the Local Administration and Local Self-Governance Act. 53.     Even if it were accepted that the actions complained of had taken place on 9   February 2019, something that had not been established, the inspection had shown that neither the village mayor nor the police had been preventing the applicants’ access to their houses on 20   February 2019 (see paragraph 50 above). Nor had that happened on 14 February 2019 when the requests before the court had been made. 54.     In two of the decisions, the court added that, even if the authorities’ actions had somehow affected the claimants’ right to enjoy their private and family life and their home under Article 8 of the Convention, they had done so within the acceptable limits on the exercise of that right, namely to ensure public safety and prevent disorder. 55.     The court concluded that the requirements of Article   250 of the Code of Administrative Procedure were not met, the claimants did not have a legal interest, and their requests had to be left without examination and the proceedings terminated. Court decisions at last instance 56 .     The seven applicants appealed before the Supreme Administrative Court (“the SAC”). They emphasised that they had been driven out of their houses under a threat of violence on 6 January 2019 and had continually been prevented from returning thereafter. In particular, when they had attempted to return to their homes on 9 February 2019, the village mayor and the police had prevented them from doing so. This had been widely reported in the media and no further proof was necessary. Such a restrictive interpretation of the law in favour of the authorities was another demonstration of the disregard for the rights of the Roma community in Voyvodinovo. Their inability to live in their homes in the middle of winter, in the absence of a final judicial decision in respect of the legality of their houses, was unacceptable. Shortly after 6 January the village and municipal mayors had had some of the buildings in their neighbourhood demolished. Video-footage of the demolition had been broadcast on primetime television. Furthermore, the local population had demonstrated that they were permanently prepared to attack the Roma, which made their peaceful return impossible. This was a fact known to the whole country. By declaring their claims inadmissible, the lower court had denied the applicants justice. 57 .     In final decisions adopted between 18 April and 7 June 2019, the SAC upheld the lower courts’ findings and confirmed that the seven applicants’ requests were inadmissible. In particular it found that the actions whose termination was being sought had ceased before the claimants had turned to the courts, which rendered Article 250 of the Code of Administrative Procedure inapplicable. COMPLAINTS TO THE PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE First set of proceedings 58 .     On 15 January 2019 the head of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, the applicants’ representative in the present case, submitted to the Chief Prosecutor that the demolition of some of the Roma buildings, shortly after they had left their neighbourhood in Voyvodinovo on 6 January 2019, had been discriminatory and targeted the Roma as a form of collective punishment, solely because of their ethnic origin. He described the background leading to these events as evidence of the alleged motivation behind the actions and submitted eight Internet links containing video-material of related media reports. 59 .     On 20 March 2019 the Plovdiv district prosecutor refused to open criminal proceedings. She referred to the demolition orders of 9 January 2019 (see paragraph 15 above) and 16 January 2019 (see paragraph 23 above) and found that no damage to property on ethnic grounds, an offence under Article   162 § 2 of the Criminal Code (see paragraph 93 below), had been committed. 60 .     The applicants’ representative appealed, complaining in addition that the Roma inhabitants had been expelled from their homes on 6 January 2019 without a lawful ground. That had been discriminatory and demeaning for them and in breach of a number of provisions of the Criminal Code. He requested that all relevant criminal-law provisions in this context be taken into consideration. 61 .     On 28 May 2019 the Plovdiv regional prosecutor quashed the district prosecutor’s decision (see paragraph 59 above). He found that her examination of the complaint had been limited to a reference to the documents in the administrative files concerning the houses in question, on which basis it had been decided that there had been no damage to property on the ground of racial hatred. The Plovdiv regional prosecutor concluded that there had been numerous investigative deficiencies, among which a failure to question any of the relevant public officials or any of the alleged victims, and a failure to establish the reasons for which the municipal authorities had begun the process of demolishing the houses after having tolerated them for many years. Likewise, it had not been established whether the inhabitants of the demolished buildings had been relocated to social housing or whether the authorities had at least offered them such a possibility. The district prosecutor’s decision had been wrong since it had been taken in the absence of fully elucidated circumstances. He returned the file to the district prosecutor for further investigation, instructing that a global assessment of the relevant facts be made under the substantive criminal law, and not solely as regards a potential offence under Article 162 § 2 of the Criminal Code. 62 .     On 29 August 2019 the Plovdiv district prosecutor, having considered the appeal by the applicants’ representative (see paragraph 60 above), implicitly refused to open criminal proceedings, finding that “it was out of the question that an offence under Article 162 of the Criminal Code had been committed”. In doing so he listed the mayoral orders issued in connection with the Roma houses (mentioned in paragraph   59 above), referred to the inspection they had been based on (see paragraphs 15 and 23 above) and noted that requests for injunctions had been brought before the administrative courts (see paragraph   39 above), before which proceedings for challenging the different mayoral orders were also pending (see paragraphs 23 above and 85 below). Five of the individuals who had been living in the houses had been questioned and none of them had managed to produce any document evidencing ownership or any construction-related papers. The municipal mayor had indicated that all requisite checks had been carried out before the demolition orders had been issued. According to the building inspection officials, who had carried out the inspection on site on 8 January 2019, all the houses had been empty on that day. All the orders had been issued in accordance with the mayor’s legal obligations and responsibilities, following the conclusions of the inspections and not as a result of racial intolerance. The district prosecutor referred the file to the Specialised Prosecutor’s Office in view of exploring whether an offence under Article 282 of the Criminal Code (see paragraph 90 below) had been committed . 63 .     The applicants’ representative appealed, emphasising that the complaint related to the chasing away of around one hundred people from their only homes on 6 January 2019, the repeated racist chanting during the subsequent anti-Roma protests in the village and the impeding of some of the Roma inhabitants from returning to their homes, including by the categorical statements of the village mayor that he would not allow them in. The representative pointed out that the prosecutor had to examine whether those acts were acts of violence on an ethnic ground. Respectively on 23 April 2020 and 12 May 2020, the Plovdiv regional prosecutor and the Plovdiv appellate prosecutor confirmed the lower prosecutor’s decisions. In a letter (not decision) of 20 July 2020 the Chief Prosecutor’s Office confirmed the appellate prosecutor’s decision, finding that there had been no evidence of intolerance on ethnic grounds. 64 .     In a decision of 27 September 2019, the Specialised Prosecutor’s Office to whom the file had been sent (see paragraph 62 above) refused to open criminal proceedings, finding that no offence had been committed. The prosecutor found that the information collected thus far sufficed to establish the circumstances and that it was unnecessary to carry out further investigative steps. The municipal mayor had acted fully within his legal obligations and responsibilities in issuing the orders under the 2001 Act (see paragraphs 15 and 23 above) and, consequently, his actions could not be examined as an offence under Article   282 § 1 of the Criminal Code or under any other criminal-law provision. Second set of proceedings At first instance 65 .     On 20 February 2019 twelve of the applicants, acting on their own behalf and on behalf of their children, complained to the Plovdiv regional prosecutor’s office . They stated that the whole Roma community of Voyvodinovo had been driven away on 6 January 2019 as a result of threats of physical violence by third parties and the explicit request by the village mayor for them to leave. The twelve applicants also complained that the village mayor and the police had not allowed them to return to their homes when they had attempted to do so on 9   February 2019. They further reiterated submissions on this point they had made before the administrative courts (see paragraph 42 above). They asked that the officials at fault be prosecuted for abuse of power or office and for exceeding their power (see paragraph 91 below), or potentially other offences. Without specifying further, they also asked the prosecutor to exercise his or her legal powers to provide them with access to their homes (see paragraph 94 below). 66 .     A preliminary inquiry into “whether an offence under Article 282 of the Criminal Code had been committed in connection with the events of 6   January 2019” was carried out by the regional economic police on a request by the regional prosecutor. 67 .     The police contacted eight of the applicants by phone, on the number indicated in the complaint. All eight of them gave statements. According to those statements, as recorded by the police, those applicants specified that they had run away on 6   January 2019 as they had been “afraid that they would otherwise get beaten” by the crowd. The village mayor had told them that people did not want them in the village and he could not control those people. V.K., a person they knew was “from some foundation” and who had said would help them, had found them in the Roma neighbourhood in Plovdiv and had given them documents to sign. They had not read the documents (some of them could not read), but he had explained to them that the purpose of the papers was to complain about having been driven away from their houses on 6 January 2019 and about the demolition of the houses. The applicants, who signed at the end of statement recorded as having been dictated by themselves, had no grievances vis-à-vis the law-enforcement officers as they had not insulted them but had protected them from the crowd and ensured their safety. They had not been treated badly by the mayor either. Their only request was for their houses not to be demolished. The municipal and village mayors and V.K., a volunteer working for the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, also gave statements. 68 .     According to the applicants’ representative, as the complainants were illiterate, the statements in question were prepared by the police and the complainants only signed them. No lawyer or other person offering support was present and the manner in which the content of those statements had been brought to their knowledge w