Stankovics Defence Requests Quashing of Verdict for Flight
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Presenting his appeal against the first instance verdict pronounced by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Defence attorney Milenko Vojo Radovic requested the Appellate Chamber to either revise the verdict or quash it.
During the trial the Prosecutor did not offer a single piece of material evidence, Radovic said, adding that the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina was not even competent in conducting trials for prison flights.
Radovic complained about the duration of the sentence, saying that an organiser of a similar escape from a prison in Ustikolina was sentenced to one year, while the helpers were sentenced to six months.
Stankovic fled from Foca prison, where he was serving his 20-year sentence for crimes against humanity, on May 25, 2007. The former member of Miljevina Battalion with the Foca Tactical Brigade of the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, was one of the organisers and supervisors of so-called Karaman house in Foca, where many women, girls and small girls were raped.
Under the first instance verdict, he was sentenced to two years in prison for the flight of a person deprived of liberty.
Prosecutor Miroslav Markovic expressed satisfaction with the two-year imprisonment sentence for Stankovic, calling on the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina to reject the appeal as unfounded.
The Chamber will render its decision at a later stage.
The indictee failed to appear the hearing today, because, as said by Radovic, he considers the indictment against him a false one.
