Shooting in the Centre

In his statement given in 2007 witness Ante Popic said that, in April 1993 he was detained in the Centre in Poculice village, where he saw several men. As he said, one evening some women, whom he did not know, were brought to the Centre.
 
“While I was lying on the following morning, I heard somebody shouting: ‘Open the door’. The guard said: ‘Go to the Commander and ask him to open it for you.’ All of a sudden somebody began shooting through the closed door,” the witness’ statement says.
 
In his statement Popic said that he heard women, who were wounded, crying for help and that “a bullet just scratched him”.  
 
“They drove the wounded by car and carried out the dead… When everything settled down, they accommodated me and some other men in a house, where we stayed until our exchange,” the statement says.
 
Jasmin Coloman is on trial for having committed murders and wounding of Croat civilians. The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, BiH, alleges that the former member of the Reconnaissance Squad with the Seventh Muslim Brigade of the Army of BiH, who was allegedly armed, came in front of the Centre in Poculice village, where civilians were detained, on April 24, 1993 and opened fire from an automatic gun, killing three and wounding nine people.
 
At this hearing Hamza Zujo, court medicine expert, presented his findings and opinion about the injuries that Ana, Stefica and Sofija Brkovic got when wounded in 1993.
 
The court expert said that, on the basis of medical documentation he concluded that all the injured parties “sustained light bodily injuries by a projectile fired from fire arms”.
 
The court expert presented his findings and opinion at the trial after the Prosecution had presented him with medical documentation. The Defence objected to such way of presenting the expert’s findings, saying that the court expert should have prepared his findings earlier and submitted it to the Defence, so it could have prepared itself for the examination.
 
“We must respect your decision, but we shall point to this objection in our closing statement,” said Defence attorney Senad Dupovac.
 
The trial is due to continue on November 14, with the presentation of the State Prosecution’s material evidence.