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The Appellate Chamber revoked the first instance verdict due to substantive violations of the criminal proceedings provisions and wrongly and incompletely determined facts.
Under the first instance verdict pronounced in April 2010, Suljo Karajic, known as Hodza, was sentenced to 18 years in prison for crimes against civilians and prisoners of war committed in the Bihac area from August 1994 to February 1995.
Karajic is a former Commander of the Second Military Police Squad of the 505th Knights Motorized Brigade with the Fifth Corps of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, ABiH.
He was found guilty of having ordered and assisted in murders, beating and inhumane treatment of civilians and prisoners of war- members of the National Defence of the Western Bosnia Autonomous Region, ND WBAR.
The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina appealed the verdict in February 2011 on the basis of wrongly and incompletely determined facts and the pronounced sentence. It called on the Appellate Chamber to revise the first instance verdict and pronounce a longer imprisonment sentence against the indictee.
The Defence appealed based on violations of the criminal proceedings provisions and the Criminal Code, wrongly and incompletely determined facts and the sentence, calling on the Court to acquit the indictee of the charges or pronounce a more lenient sentence.
“After having reviewed the verdict within the scope of the appeals allegations, the Appellate Chamber rendered a decision revoking the first instance verdict,” the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina said in its announcement.
