| War crimes case against K. Serb dismissed |
| 6 November 2009 | 07:09
| Source:
Beta |
KOSOVSKA MITROVICA --
The District Court in Prizren has dismissed war crimes charges against former municipal president of Orahovac Anđelko Kolašinac.
According to Miodrag Brkljač, the lawyer of the accused, one local and two EULEX judges made up the trial chamber, with British Malcolm Simmons presiding.
Brkljač said that the decision put an end to “the Kolašinac case“, since the prosecutor had dropped the charges.
He added that his client could only persecuted based on a private lawsuit.
Kolašinac was first detained on August 20, 1999. He spent 4 years, four months and 16 days in prison, his lawyer explained.
The first indictment was issued by a local prosecutor on August 7, 2000, after almost a year of investigating.
A district trial chamber chaired by UNMIK Judge Ingo Rosch dropped the charges of war crimes and pronounced Kolašinac guilty of helping the perpetrator after the crime.
He was then sentenced to five years in prison. The Kosovo Supreme court overturned the verdict on November 2, 2001, but international prosecutor Thomas Hickman, of the United States, took over the case and changed the indictment twice.
Kolašinac was then found guilty of war crimes and convicted to eight years in prison on March 31, 2003.
After the defense lodged an appeal, the Kosovo Supreme overturned the verdict once again on March 22, 2003.
Kolašinac was finally cleared of all charges during the repeated trial before the District Court in Prizren on November 4, 2009.
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