Zelenika Requests Mental Health Evaluation
This post is also available in: Bosnian
Mostar’s cantonal court has postponed the Ivan Zelenika trial until the court can determine whether Zelenika is mentally stable enough to follow the trial.
Zelenika, a former soldier with the Croatian Defense Council, is charged with the inhumane treatment and abuse of Bosniak civilians in the Mostar area in 1993 and 1994. The indictment against him was originally filed by the state prosecution, but the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina referred the case to the cantonal court in Mostar for further processing.
Zelenika had previously said that he didn’t feel capable of following the trial, due to a serious mental illness.
“I have been diagnosed with post-traumatic syndrome, with permanent consequences. I have been in such a condition since 1995…Sometimes I fall down five times in just one day. I visit the emergency clinic every other day. They give me sedative injections. I am a war veteran with a disability. I was wounded three times. There’s a bullet in my head, which can’t be taken out safely,” Zelenika said.
Defense attorney Branko Karadeglic handed over Zelenika’s medical records to the trial chamber. He requested that the court order Zelenika’s examination by a neuropsychiatrist.
“When I was appointed his attorney, our first conversation focused on his health. He complained to me that he wouldn’t live to see this trial begin. Considering the fact that Zelenika can’t follow the trial, I propose that the court decide, once the neuropsychiatric examination has been completed, to discontinue the proceedings and put my client under the custody of a social care service,” Karadeglic said.
Slavko Pavlovic, judge and chairman of the trial chamber, said that the trial’s start date would be postponed until Zelenika’s health condition had been evaluated. At that point, he said, the court would determine whether he is mentally capable of following the trial.
Zelenika is on trial in another case before the state court, with Srecko Herceg, Edib Buljubasic, Ivan Medic and Marina Grubisic-Fejzic, for crimes allegedly committed in the Dretelj detention camp.
