Today, November 27, 2024, the press conference "Magistrates' Money: What Public Data Tells Us" was held at the Bulgarian News Agency.
Magistrates' savings almost tripled over a ten-year period.
The analysis of the public declarations, that magistrates submit to the Inspectorate of the Supreme Judicial Council, shows that magistrates’ savings almost tripled over a ten-year period. Technological tools were used to extract the information from the public declarations and data analysis software was used to summarize and analyses the information aggregated.
Over a period of ten years (from 2013 to 2023), the savings declared by magistrates increased from BGN 28.7 thousand to BGN 79 thousand on average per person. It is interesting to note that until 2019 the savings declared by family members of magistrates are higher than the savings of magistrates, after 2019 this trend reverses and magistrates declare a higher average financial savings than their family members. Over the years, the share of magistrates declaring cash has also been increasing - from just under a third in 2013, their share rises to 80% by 2023.
Persons whose total amount of all declared cash is over 100 thousand leva increases from 4% at the beginning of the period (2013) to about 30% at the end (2023). By 2023, persons declaring cash over BGN 200 thousand are 10% of investigators declaring in the relevant year, 11% of prosecutors and 13% of judges.
The distances between different types of magistrates (judges, prosecutors, investigators) in different periods are less than 10%. For example, the average declared financial resources per person of judges are 10% higher than those of prosecutors and 6% higher than those of investigating magistrates.
More sensitive are the differences between the different instances. In 2023, the average amount of cash declared by judges at the supreme courts is the highest - BGN 142 000, followed by the average financial resources declared by judges at the appellate level (BGN 125 000) and judges at the district level - BGN 94 000. The declared resources in district courts are 65 thousand BGN on average per person. And if the monetary means declared by prosecutors at the district and appellate level are roughly similar to those of judges at the same levels, at the cassation level this difference seriously widens, and at the district level is within about BGN 10 000 in favour of judges. With an average of BGN 123 000 of available savings and cash declared by prosecutors in the Supreme Prosecution/Prosecutor General Office’s, their colleagues in the highest courts declare an average of BGN 142 000.
The disparities in accumulated financial resources over the ten-year period under study highlight the widening gaps between the different levels of the judiciary. These differences are most serious in the courts. If at the beginning of the period the distances between the regional, district and appellate levels in terms of declared financial resources are small, at the end of the period the differences increase significantly. This trend is also present in the prosecution, but with a smaller amplitude. The savings of the prosecutors in the European Public Prosecutor's Office increased the fastest (almost 5 times in 3 years).
In almost the entire period studied, at all levels of the judiciary, the declared financial resources (deposits and available cash) of judges were slightly higher than those of prosecutors.
The picture thus painted shows an increase in savings and available financial resources for all types of magistrates, an increase in the number of people whose savings are increasing and subject to declaration, and an increase in the gaps between the different levels compared to the gaps that existed 10 years ago.
