Local Justice Tanasic and Boroja: Verdict Due on July 4
This post is also available in: Bosnian
The Trial Chamber of the District Court in Banja Luka is due to pronounce the verdict on July 4 this year.
District Prosecutor Branko Mitrovic said that it had been proved, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the indictees had killed Nazifa Somic and tried to kill her son Muharem in September 1995.
There are many aggravating circumstances in the case of the indictees, because, as policemen, instead of doing something like this, they should have protected citizens, Mitrovic said.
Jovo Pilipovic, Defence attorney of Tanasic, said that the Prosecution has not found any pieces of evidence linking my client with the war crime.
It has not been proved that Nazifa was killed. Besides that, the Prosecution charges the indictees with attempted murder, but it has not even shown that Muharem was injured, Pilipovic said.
Miodrag Stojanovic, Defence attorney of the second indictee, said that the District Prosecution has proved nothing in this case.
According to the indictment, this event happened on September 19. Most of the witnesses said that my client was on a battlefield at the time, so he could not have possibly been present in Banja Luka , Stojanovic said.
Stojanovic mentioned that the identification had not been conducted in a lawful manner, because injured party Muharem recognised the indictees among four persons whom he personally knew.
Prior to the presentation of closing statements, Milan Surucic, former Commander of the Special Purposes Police Company, whose member indictee Boroja was in 1995, testified at this hearing. He said that he was in the Martin brod area together with Boroja from September 15 to 27, 1995.
Following the withdrawal, our Company was split. Some people moved in a different direction. Boroja was among those who moved in the other direction, Surucic said.G.O.———————————————————————————————–This article is made possible by the support of the American People through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID.) The contents of this article are the sole responsibility of Balkan investigative reporting network (BIRN) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.
