Samardzija Decision Due Soon

Following the first instance court’s decision to jail Marko Samardzija for 26 years, both Prosecution and Defence appealed on the grounds that “the facts were determined in a wrong and incomplete way”.

A decision on this is now expected next month.

Zlatko Knezevic, the indictee’s defence attorney, asked for the first instance verdict to be revoked and a new trial to be opened, so that his client could be pronounced innocent.

Knezevic considers the 26-year sentence to be “a life sentence” having in mind that the indictee was born in 1936.

But Prosecutor Vesna Ilic asked the appeals judges to restart the process in order to sentence the accused “to more than 26 years”. The Prosecution considers that the first instance judges did not take into consideration “the fact that the accused helped but also abetted the crimes in Biljani settlement”.

The appeal filed by the Prosecution alleges that the first instance chamber passed the verdict concluding that Samardzija was complicit in the murders of 144 persons, and not 230, as was originally stated in the indictment.

“Mass graves where unidentified bodies had been found were omitted. The verdict indicates that those bodies do not belong to persons killed on 10 July 1992, although witnesses spoke about loss of family members who had been buried in those graves,” said Ilic.

Samardzija, who was a commander of the 3rd troop of Sanica battalion of Republika Srpska Army, was found guilty of helping the attacks on civilians on the territory of Kljuc municipality on 10 July 1992.

Defence attorney Knezevic also thinks that, allegedly, “the right to defence was affected when the prosecution’s request to close part of the trial to the public in order to protect witnesses was accepted, while a similar request by the defence was not approved”.

Knezevic also complained because the verdict does not explain why some defence witness testimonies were not accepted, but also why certain testimonies of prosecution witnesses were accepted as valid.

Explaining his reasons for appeal, Samardzija said that “he was cheated on that day in July”, when he received orders to invite the local population to the school in Biljane in order to give them movement permissions, adding that he did not know what was going to happen there.

“If I hate anybody or if I am a nationalist I deserve a death punishment! I have been sentenced although I am innocent,” he said.

The judges will hand down a decision concerning the appeals within one month.