Franjo Varga and Blaz Curic, suspects in the so-called fake text messages case, will remain in investigative custody for another two months, the Osijek County Court ruled on Wednesday.

The court upheld a motion by the organised crime police unit, Uskok, and ruled that the two men would remain in custody until February 19.

Uskok had called for an extension of detention because the investigation had not been finalised yet and new evidence emerged during the investigation.

The text message affair began when Franjo Varga, a computer expert formerly employed by the Croatian police, was arrested in September on suspicion of producing forged text message correspondence for the convicted football mogul Zdravko Mamic and three of Mamic’s co-defendants during their trial for syphoning 115.8 million kuna (€15.6 million) from the Dinamo Zagreb football club.

Varga is suspected of creating printouts of fake text conversations between the former head state prosecutor Dinko Cvitan and a judge at Osijek court where Mamic was on trial, falsely indicating that Cvitan was pressuring the judge into convicting Mamic.

In his deposition to investigators, Varga spoke about his cooperation with former leader of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), Tomislav Karamarko, and his deputy Milijan Brkic as well as with former Agrokor owner Ivica Todoric and presidential adviser Vlado Galic, who had introduced Varga to Karamarko. Galic resigned last week.

Blaz Curic, a chauffer at the Ministry of Agriculture, was arrested on suspicion of having notified computer expert Franjo Varga of an ongoing investigation ahead of Varga’s arrest in September.

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