Lucic: First instance verdict revoked

Eight months after the first instance verdict was announced against Kreso Lucic, which sentenced him to six years imprisonment for crimes committed in Kresevo, the Appellate Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, BiH revoked the first instance verdict and ordered a retrial.

In September last year Lucic was announced guilty, as commander of the Military Polcie Squad with the Croatian Defence Council, of having unlawfully deprived Bosniaks from Kresevo of liberty, tortured them and held them in inhumane conditions in the detention camps established on the territory of that municipality. One of the detention camps was formed in “Sunje” silage.

He was acquitted of the charges that he allegedly abused one person.

Both parties appealed the first instance verdict. The Prosecution appealed the acquitting part of the verdict, while the Defence appealed the sentence and the qualification of the crime but also the application of the Criminal Code of BiH.

The Appellate Chamber upheld the appeals filed by the Prosecution and Defence and it decided to revoke the verdict and order a retrial bearing in mind the “substantive violations of the criminal procedure provisions.”