Protected Witness Says Bosnian Army Guard Repeatedly Raped Her

S.M. said a few months after her arrest in the spring of 1992, she was transferred to a detention facility located in a garage between two buildings, and then to the basement of an unfinished building in November or December 1992. Lalicic was a guard in both locations.

According to S.M., during her detainment Lalicic took her to an office, where he slapped her several times, pulled her by the hair, and hit her with a baseball in the groin twice. He told her not to tell anyone about her beating. S.M. said Lalicic took her to an improvised bathroom twelve times, and raped her over a bathtub.

“He acted as if nothing was happening, while I felt humiliated, miserable, and terrible,” S.M. said.

S.M. said she didn’t have anyone to confide in, not even the other prisoners.

“Nobody saw anything, but it could be heard. The walls have ears, if they don’t have eyes,” S.M. said.

When asked by the defense if she knew what was happening to the other detained women, S.M. said she didn’t. She said she assumed that “the same thing happened to them when they were called up,” and that “they [the other prisoners] don’t care confirm it.”

Defense attorney Sabina Mehic asked S.M. why she said that she’d been raped in a statement she’d given in 2007, but failed to specify other details.

S.M. said she left out details in her statement out of concern for her family.

“I’ve had male children. I kept silent for 22 years. I wanted to talk about what happened to me…to make it easier,” S.M. said.

The trial chamber asked S.M. if Lalicic was the only person who raped her. S.M. confirmed that was the case.

Testifying at the same hearing, witness Branka Gataric said S.M. told her that she had been raped. She said S.M. told her in December 2014, and that she’d previously heard that S.M. had been raped.

“She was taken away by that Zaim, I forgot his last name. He hit her on the head, raped her, and threatened her,” Gataric said.

Zaim Lalicicic is charged with rape and sexual abuse and with participating in the physical and mental abuse of a detained civilian in 1992 and 1993.

According to the state prosecution’s indictment, Lalicic committed these crimes as a guard and member of the First Corps of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, at a detention facility located in the basement of an unfinished building in Hrasnica in Ilidza.

The trial will continue on March 16.