Published on 15 September 2025
THIRD SECTION
Application no. 15038/22
Petya Lyudmilova PEEVA and Others
against Bulgaria
lodged on 17 March 2022
communicated on 28 August 2025
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns complaints under Article 8 of the Convention about the unlawfulness and lack of proportionality of a personal search of the first applicant and of search-and-seizure operations carried out at the applicants’ homes. The applicants also invoke Article 6 and Article 13 in conjunction with Article 8, complaining that they had no access to a court to challenge the search-and-seizure operations.
The applicants are four individuals: an adult couple (the first and second applicants) and the second applicant’s parents (the third and fourth applicants).
On 2 November 2021 the first and second applicants were charged with participating in an organised criminal group for the purpose of committing offences related to archaeological valuables and trade in cultural property. On the same date the authorities conducted a personal search of the first applicant; they also searched a house registered as the permanent address of the first, third and fourth applicants, and an apartment where the first and second applicants lived, and seized numerous items.
On 20 October 2021 a judge had given prior authorisations for the personal search of the first applicant and for the search-and-seizure operations in relation to the criminal case opened against the first and second applicants.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Did the search-and-seizure operations carried out on 2 November 2021 at the two dwellings of the applicants, and the personal search of the first applicant, constitute interferences with the applicants’ right to respect for their home and with the first applicant’s right to respect for her private life, within the meaning of Article 8 § 1 of the Convention? If so, were the interferences with the exercise of these rights provided for by law and necessary, within the meaning of Article 8 § 2 (see, mutatis mutandis, Govedarski v. Bulgaria, no. 34957/12, §§ 87-89, 16 February 2016; Stoyanov and Others v. Bulgaria, no. 55388/10, §§ 132-134, 31 March 2016, and Marin Yosifov, no. 5113/11, §§ 67-70, 13 October 2020)?
2. Did the applicants have at their disposal, as required by Article 13 of the Convention, an effective domestic remedy through which they could raise their complaints in relation to Article 8 (see Posevini v. Bulgaria, no. 63638/14, §§ 83-87, 19 January 2017)?
3. Did the applicants have access to a court to challenge the search‑and‑seizure operations, as required under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?
The parties are invited to provide legible copies of the search-and-seizure records of 2 November 2021 as well as of any other documents relevant to the applicants’ complaints.
APPENDIX
No.
Applicant’s Name
Year of birth
Nationality
Place of residence
1.
Petya Lyudmilova PEEVA
1979
Bulgarian
Hrabrovo
2.
Krasimir Minchev KRASTEV
1980
Bulgarian
Provadiya
3.
Mincho Krastev TSVETANOV
1945
Bulgarian
Provadiya
4.
Todorka Ivanova TSVETANOVA
1950
Bulgarian
Provadiya