here - Humanitarian Law Center/Fond za humanitarno pravo

Lončar or other members of the JNA in the chain of command. Instead, the TRZ opted to leave
out of the amended indictment all the victims for whose death the JNA could be held responsible.
Furthermore, the deputy prosecutor in charge of this case, Veselin Mrdak, in his closing
argument, justified the conduct of the JNA and interpreted its role at the time of the events in the
village of Lovas in a way that contradicted the evidence heard during the trial.
Pronouncing sentence, the presiding judge also noted the lack of readiness on the part of TRZ to
prosecute all the responsible persons. She stated that the chamber had found that the 2nd
Proletarian Guard Mechanized Brigade of the JNA was to be held primarily responsible for the
attack on Lovas and everything that happened during the attack, adding that a valuable amount of
evidence had been presented during the trial, which “leaves open the possibility for the
prosecutor to seek justice for family members of the victims, who, after being included in the
initial indictment, were left out from its amended version”. “We have heard in this courtroom”
the presiding judge added, “the full names of some other actors involved in the events in
question, some of them even appeared before us as witnesses, so the prosecutor should fulfill the
promise he gave in his closing argument and look into their criminal responsibility as well, if we
are to ensure fairness both to the victims and the accused.”
The amended indictment omitted to mention the forced expulsion of Croatian civilians from
Lovas, even though this fact was established in court on the basis of numerous testimonies given
by injured parties testifying for the prosecution and the defense alike. The presiding judge also
pointed out this omission by the TRZ saying that “an important segment of the events in this area
– expulsion of Croatian civilians from the area controlled by JNA – was left out of the
indictment.”
The TRZ did not completely succeed in proving even the charges set forth in the amended
indictment, since the court held that the responsibility of the accused for the death of civilians
was conclusively proved with respect to only 41 of the 44 persons named in the amended
indictment. Nevertheless, the TRZ, after posting the judgment in this case on its website, issued a
press release in which it falsely stated that the amended indictment, filed on 28 December 2011,
had charged the indictees with “depriving 70 Croatian civilians of life”. 134
As regards the sentences imposed and the reasons the court was guided by in determining the
sentences, the HLC holds that giving consideration to the amount of time that has passed since
the crimes i.e. 20 years, during which the majority of the indictees had returned to normal life,
could not be justified. The length of time between the commission of a crime and the subsequent
judgment may, in principle, be taken into account for mitigation in cases of ordinary crimes,
where the perpetrator, by refraining from re-offending over a prolonged period of time, shows his
attitude towards a criminal act and resocialization. However, in the case of war crimes, where the
existence of an armed conflict is the objective precondition for incrimination, the amount of time
passed has no bearing, since once the conflict is over, the criminal act cannot be repeated. That
the length of time passed should not be taken as a mitigating circumstance is indirectly borne out
134 “128 years’ imprisonment for war crimes against Croatian civilians in Lovas”, 26 June 2012, www.trz.org.rs
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