Strange Tale of a Spooky Mobile Number from Bulgaria

Introduction

People have many superstitions about the numbers. This is especially true among people in third world countries. For instance, people have aversion for the number 13 as they consider it innocuous. Hence, they may not like to get themselves associated with that number.  This inauspicious number works in the realms of imagination of people as that of haunted and ill luck. Since people are already in midst of problems and hardships, they don’t want to choose this number at any cost. Similarly, a telecom company has suspended a Bulgarian number forever after it discovered a pattern emerging among its owners. The company has discovered that all its owners have died in due course of time. The jinxed number in question is 0888 888 888. In this article, we would be looking at the strange tale of this spooky number that killed its owners.

Spooky Number 

It all began with a fascination for this number that looks trendy and appealing. It was first owned by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the issuing telecom company Mobitel. Reportedly, the Mobitel CEO Vladimir Grashnov died of cancer in 2001. According to a report that appeared in Mail Online, Vladimir was rumored to have been ‘radioactively poisoned by his business rivals’. The radioactive poisoning caused cancer in that individual. People initially thought it was just a one-off case. Later, a mafia don Konstantin Dimitrov took up this number. He was also killed in 2003 by an assassin in Netherlands. The mafia don incidentally had gone there to inspect his 500 million-worth drug empire. According to the news report, Russian mafia groups killed the Konstantin over the issue of business jealousy. The report further added that the don had the phone with him when he died. After the death of the second owner, another person by the name Konstantin Dishliev owned this number. This person was also killed in a shootout just outside an Indian restaurant in Bulgaria’s capital Sofia. According to the online site Mail Online that tracked the history of the number, Dishliev was also running a cocaine trafficking operation at the time of his death. This case is still open in the Bulgarian courts.

What has the Company Done?

After the death of three people who owned this number, the telecom company Mobitel had suspended its re-issuance in 2005. As a result, people who try to call this number always get the same message ‘outside the network coverage’. However, the company has not responded to the pertinent questions on this number. When the Mail Online tried to contact the company, it was not coming clean on the status of this number. The unnamed sources in the company responded by saying “We have no comments to make. We will not discuss individual numbers.”