Freed War Criminal Zdravko Mucic Drowns in Bosnia
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An autopsy on Monday confirmed that war criminal Zdravko Mucic’s death was caused by “drowning as a consequence of a stroke”, the spokesperson for the Herzegovina-Neretva Cantonal Prosecution, Ana Rajic, told BIRN.
Mucic’s disappearance was reported on Friday and his body was found in Lake Jablanica in the village of Cerici, near the town of Konjic, over the weekend.
He was the wartime commander of a Bosnian Army-controlled detention camp in Celebici, near Konjic, and was sentenced to nine years in prison by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in 1998 for crimes against Serb detainees.
The verdict said that Mucic was involved in maintaining inhumane living conditions for the detained Serb civilians and was responsible, as the detention camp’s commander, for creating an atmosphere of fear.
Under his command from May to November 1992, eight detainees died because they were beaten up by guards, while one detainee was shot dead while trying to escape the beating, the verdict said.
Mucic was given early release in 2003, after he had served two-thirds of his sentence.
Lawyer Nihada Buturovic, who was a member of his legal team at one point, and who said she had known Mucic since childhood, told BIRN that he was 65 when he died.
