Hit with a Baton

A State Prosecution witness says, testifying at the trial for crimes in the Kladanj area, that Nusret Muhic hit him in the Police Station premises.

Ratko Martinovic, who was detained in Stupari in 1992, said that, during the course of his detention he was taken to the Police Station in Kladanj. As he said, upon his arrival, he was detained in one room together with Dobrivoje Jovicic.

“Ten minutes later five or six policemen entered the room. I think they were reserve policemen. They came and beat me up. I had never been beaten like that before. They hit me with rifle butts, boots, cursed my Serb mother …” he said.

He told the Court that he was beaten up again and that Nusret Muhic entered the room after that beating.

“Nisret Muhic and another man appeared immediately. They began shouting: ‘Who hit you, man? Who did that to you? Tell us’. I said that I stumbled upon something and hit myself when I fell,” said Martinovic, testifying via video link.

He said that, later on he was taken to an office, where Muhic was. In that office he was examined about weapons.

“A man, who was standing behind my back, hit me. Nusret took a baton. I got many beatings with that baton. I got beatings on my back and chest. My back and chest were covered with black bruises,” the witness said.

Muhic, a former Chief of the Group of Preventing and Fighting Crime with the Public Safety Station in Kladanj, is charged with having examined unlawfully detained civilians.

He is on trial, along with Safet Mujcinovic, Selman Busnov, Zijad Hamzic, Ramiz Halilovic, Osman Gogic, Nedzad Hodzic and Kahro Vejzovic, former members of civil and military police and the Territorial Defence, for the unlawful detention of Serb civilians in Stupari, as well as the beating and inhumane treatment.

When asked by the Prosecution whether he saw Muhic after the beating in the office, witness Martinovic said that he saw him later that evening, when he was taken out to the hallway, where a young man beat him.

The witness was returned from the Police Station in Kladanj to the educational workers’ building in Stupari, where he stayed until February 1993.

At the beginning of the hearing Martinovic said that he was detained in late May 1992. As he said, during his detention he used to see Safet Mujcinovic, whom he remembered by “unpleasant situations”.

He explained that Mujcinovic did not allow his wife and children to stay in Stupari.

The trial is due to continue on February 6.