Bosnia’s New Chief Prosecutor Undergoes Stormy Start

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council appointed Gordana Tadic as acting chief prosecutor in September following the suspension of former chief prosecutor Goran Salihovic, but she hasn’t had an easy start.

This month, the state prosecution came under sustained criticism after ten former Bosnian Croat fighters were arrested on suspicion of committing war crimes in the town of Orasje. Croat media in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the government in Zagreb expressed anger and accused the prosecution of bias.

The High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council insisted however that the country’s judicial institutions would continue to do their job professionally and not succumb to the pressure.

“We call on all those who are commenting on current judicial proceedings in Bosnia and Herzegovina, especially those related to war crimes, to carefully consider all the implications which such statements can have on the perceptions of victims of war crimes, and on the integrity and independence of the judiciary and citizens’ trust in that judiciary,” the council said in a statement.

After a 20-year career as a prosecutor, Tadic has to establish herself in a position which has seen a series of forced changes in recent years.

Her predecessor Salihovic was suspended because of disciplinary action and a criminal investigation into allegations that he misused his powers by ensuring that investigations into Bosnian Serb President Milorad Dodik were stopped.

Since the Bosnian state prosecution was first established, none of the chief prosecutors has held on to their job until the end of their six-year term in office.

When the first chief prosecutor, Marinko Jurcevic, stepped down, media reported that pressure from the international community was the reason, although he never confirmed this publicly.

Milorad Barasin was dismissed as chief prosecutor due to disciplinary proceedings, but he continued working as a state prosecutor. Jadranka Lokmic-Misiraca, who became the acting chief prosecutor, was not appointed to the job permanently.

Case experience

Tadic was elected to the state prosecution in late 2013. She was involved in war crimes cases and later managed the prosecution’s war crimes section.

She sometimes stood in for her colleagues at war crimes trials and handled the case against Jasmin Coloman, a former member of the Commando Squad of the Bosnian Army’s Seventh Muslim Brigade, by herself.

Under the first-instance verdict, Coloman was acquitted of participating in the murder of Croat civilians in the Vitez municipality.

But after appeals were filed, the state court’s appeals chamber quashed the verdict and ordered a retrial. Coloman was then convicted and sentenced to three years in prison.

Lawyer Senad Dupovac, who represented Coloman, said that Tadic made the most of her case considering the evidence she had to draw upon.

“I think her evidence was not of such quality and quantity as to be sufficient for a verdict of conviction. In that context, she got more than she had,” Dupovac said.

Tadic could not improve the quality of the evidence, but she did make the appeals chamber believe her, he explained.

She also acted for the prosecution in the case against Minet Akeljic, Saban Haskic, Senad Bilal, Hazim Patkovic and Semsudin Djelilovic, former military policemen with the First Battalion of the Bosnian Army’s 325th Mountain Brigade, who were charged with physically and sexually abusing Croat civilians and prisoners of war.

Before joining the state prosecution, Tadic was the deputy to the chief prosecutor at the cantonal prosecution in Tuzla, where she worked on a case that drew international as well as local media attention.

At the trial, married couple Milenko and Slavica Marinkovic were both found guilty of imprisoning and abusing a German girl called Bettina Siegner for more than six years at their house in Karavlasi-Gojcin in the Kalesija municipality.

When appointing staff members to managerial positions at judicial institutions, the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council seeks to ensure that if the chief prosecutor belongs to one of the country’s three main ethnic groups, the two deputy prosecutors are of other ethnicities.

The HJPC declined to name Tadic’s ethnicity, saying the information was personal. But according to media reports, she identifies herself as a Croat.

Her appointment as acting chief prosecutor came as a welcome relief to staff at the state prosecution, whoere she enjoys the respect of her colleagues, sources told BIRN.