The second day in the trial against Marina Barak (previously Marina Andreeva), the former CFO of the Israeli-Bulgarian cybercrime organization E&G Bulgaria was being held today. The judges continued their questioning. Moreover, her husband, Gal Barak, was also scheduled to testify. He was already sentenced in September 2020 as principal and CEO of E&G Bulgaria to four years in prison and is currently in prison in Austria. In the run-up, Gal Barak had unpacked and accused his former partners and employees like Ilan Tzorya or Boyan Popov. Besides the Barak’s, Gery Shalon, Vladislav Smirnov, and Ilan Tzorya are prime suspects.
At the beginning of the second trial day, Marina stuck to her strategy that she would not have known about anything material. She presented herself as the kind of secretary who would have carried out orders without any queries. Victims? What victims? She would not have known anything about victims.
The result was that the court expressed its view that Marina evidently thinks the court is stupid. Contempt of Court, it was!
Gal and his Rabbi
After the questioning of Marina Barak by the two judges, Gal Barak was called as a witness. It is currently in extradition custody and is to be transferred to Germany. The next trial awaits him there. As in his trial, the Rabbi of Gal Barak was again present in the courtroom, mocking the private prosecutors and the victims’ representatives. The Rabbi has apparently not accepted that his protégé Gal Barak has been legally convicted of fraud and is, in fact, a criminal who has defrauded tens of thousands of victims in Europe of an estimated €200 million.
No remorse and no crime
In his testimony, Gal Barak confronted the court with bold lies. Everything would have been in order at E&G Bulgaria. No crime happened; actually, he claimed. Only the software – Tradologic and PandaTS – had been manipulated, but that was for sure not his fault. The judges lost patience with Barak’s lies and reprimanded him. He was asked why he had been sentenced to four years’ imprisonment and why he had accepted this punishment if everything was in order.
His beloved Marina would have received only a salary of €500. He would have paid her everything because he was a gentleman, he told the court. She would have known nothing about the operations of E&G Bulgaria. Neither Gal nor Marina could answer why she was then called the E&G Bulgaria‘s Chief Financial Officer. Gal also denied in his trial that he had been the cybercrime organization’s CEO. The title would have been used just for fun. Remorse looks different, and hopefully, the judges in Germany will see it that way.
No more answers
After questioning Barak, Marina Barak‘s lawyer Norbert Wess told the court that his client would not answer any more questions from now on. Thus, she is no longer available for the prosecutor’s questions. The verdict will show whether this is a good and effective defense strategy.
The trial will continue on Monday.
More Defendants
The prosecution in the Vienna Cybercrime Trials lists several lieutenants as defendants in addition to the main suspects. These include Israelis Kfir Levy, Itzik Gellet, Gilad Mayer, Tal-Jacki Zecharia Fitelzon, Amit Hulin, Chen Ganon, or Chen Darshan. These are just a few of the dozens of people being investigated in this criminal case by law enforcement agencies in various European countries. The Vienna Cybercrime Trials are just the prelude to a series of other trials in other jurisdictions.
