Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
07PODGORICA2
2007-01-03 15:26:00
UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
Embassy Podgorica
Cable title:  

SOLE SUSPECT ACQUITTED IN 2004 MURDER OF OPPOSTION EDITOR

Tags:  PGOV KCRM CVIS SOCI MW 
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VZCZCXRO8110
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ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 031526Z JAN 07
FM AMEMBASSY PODGORICA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 0022
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUFOADA/JAC MOLESWORTH RAF MOLESWORTH UK
RUEHNO/USMISSION USNATO 0005
RUEHPOD/AMEMBASSY PODGORICA 0024
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 PODGORICA 000002 

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV KCRM CVIS SOCI MW
SUBJECT: SOLE SUSPECT ACQUITTED IN 2004 MURDER OF OPPOSTION EDITOR

REF: A. A) 2004 BELGRADE 1149, 1172


B. B) 2005 BELGRADE 1741

SUMMARY AND COMMENT

-------------------



UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 PODGORICA 000002

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV KCRM CVIS SOCI MW
SUBJECT: SOLE SUSPECT ACQUITTED IN 2004 MURDER OF OPPOSTION EDITOR

REF: A. A) 2004 BELGRADE 1149, 1172


B. B) 2005 BELGRADE 1741

SUMMARY AND COMMENT

--------------




1. (U) Damir Mandic, accused of taking part in the May 2004
murder (Ref A) of the editor-in-chief of the opposition
Podgorica based daily "Dan", Dusko Jovanovic, was acquitted on
December 27 by the Higher Court in Podgorica. Mandic was accused
of, along with other unknown persons, killing Jovanovic on May
27, 2004 at 23:45 with an automatic weapon fired from a car
while Jovanovic was leaving the Dan editorial offices in
Podgorica. Dan is an opposition daily which sharply criticized
former PM Milo Djukanovic. Representatives of the opposition
have used Jovanovic's murder as another club with which to
hammer the Government, claiming it was politically motivated and
that Montenegrin authorities have covered up the involvement of
senior officials. End summary.




2. (SBU) Comment: The murder of editor Jovanovic, and the trial
of Mandic, have been highly politicized since the very first
day. Additionally, the judges and courts of Montenegro are
generally held in low esteem, and considered to be subject to
impermissible outside influences. Both of these observations
explain the sharp reactions to the acquittal; neither
necessarily invalidates the legitimacy of the judge's ruling.
With tempers and passions running hot on this case, no local
observer has commented that the evidence never conclusively puts
Mandic at the scene and time of the crime, nor does the evidence
demonstrate that Mandic was aware of the intended purpose of the
weapons and vehicle. Mandic may know more than he is admitting
on the record; on the other hand, Mandic may have been just one
of the "usual suspects" in a case where the GoM felt it had to b
seen as doing something. But the rush to arrest to arrest just
one member of what is claimed to be a larger conspiracy is as
inexplicable as the apparent reluctance to arrest any other
individuals implicated.




3. (SBU) At this comparatively late date, the facts of the
Jovanovic murder -- who was involved, and the motivations -- may
never come out. Jovanovic was a controversial character; not
only was he a leading critic of the Government and then PM

Djukanovic, his business dealings ran the gamut of Montenegro
society, including contacts with the violent if small organized
crime strata. Nor can more mundane motivations for his murder
be ruled out. To paraphrase, the recent trial of Damir Mandic
again demonstrates that hard cases make for bad law enforcement.
A more solid police and prosecution case would have allowed for
justified criticism of an acquittal, but the holes in the
evidence were sufficient to create reasonable doubts about
whether the Government had proven its case against Mandic. End
comment.



Crime and No Punishment

--------------




4. (U) The police and prosecution have, to date, only actively
pursued one suspect in the May 2004 murder of opposition
newspaper editor Dusko Jovanovic. One week after the murder,
Damir Mandic was arrested for complicity in Jovanovic's murder.
While forensic evidence connected Mandic to the
instrumentalities of the crime, and Mandic had been associated
with Jovanovic prior to the murder, the trial judge
(coincidentally also named Mandic, but no relation) ruled on
December 27 that the evidence was insufficient to sustain
charges that Mandic was involved in the planning (or
implementation) of the murder. Mandic was convicted of unrelated
charges in a 2002 kidnapping.



Family and Opposition Embittered

--------------




5. (U) The family of the late editor assessed the verdict as an

PODGORICA 00000002 002 OF 004


"unprecedented shame of the judiciary. Jovanovic's brother said
that the family had long anticipated an acquittal, saying that
the judge did all he could to hush up the murder. Jovanovic's
widow announced she would appeal the ruling to numerous
international courts. Jovanovic's colleagues from the daily
"Dan" called it "scandalous," adding their view that enough
evidence had been presented during the trial for Mandic to be
convicted and calling upon the public to protest against the
"shameful" decision.




6. (U) The opposition parties jointly stated that the verdict
showed that Montenegrin judiciary is corrupted and that "law and
justice are sold for dirty money." The opposition walked out of
the parliament session during the debate on the 2007 Budget in
protest, and moved for an emergency session of Parliament to
discuss the case as well as 27 unresolved murders. They seconded
the call for public protests; none have appeared so far.
(Comment: The winter holidays and cold, wet weather have likely
played a role in muting public reaction. End comment.)




7. (U) The Ruling coalition representatives repeated their
support for the state institutions, indicating that the request
for a parliamentary inquiry would be rejected. One exception was
the head of the Montenegrin police, Veselin Veljovic, who
defended the work of his department and assessed the Court's
decision as an obstruction of the work of the police and other
state bodies.



Prosecutor To Appeal Acquittal Verdict

--------------




8. (U) Montenegrin Supreme State Prosecutor Vesna Medenica has
announced an appeal to the Appellate Court because of acquital
verdict. Medenica said the prosecution performed its job in a
professional manner by providing "evidence of such reliability
that has never before been reviewed by a court in Montenegro."
She dismissed the accusations by the opposition about "corrupted
prosecution" and called their representatives to prove those
allegations.



BACKGROUND: NEWSPAPER EDITOR MURDERED

--------------




9. (U) Note: Following detail from the criminal proceedings is
provided for visa lookout purposes, and to shed light on the
current state of Montenegro's ability to prosecute organized
crime. End note. Damir Mandic was arrested on June 3, 2004, on
charges of participating, along with other unknown perpetrators,
in the deliberate and planned murder of Dusko Jovanovic and his
bodyguard Milorad Mirovic on May 27, 2004, in Podgorica.
According to the bill of indictment, a group plotting to murder
Dusko Jovanovic had on February 6, 2004 called Veselin Vuceljic
from Mandic's mobile phone in order to buy a blue VW Golf 3
without license plate numbers (which is stated as being the
vehicle from which Jovanovic was shot). The windows of that
vehicle were tinted in a car service shop owned by Uros
Marcetic, where also the fake license plates were placed on it.
Mandic is accused of providing two automatic rifles (type Crvena
Zastava - Red Flag) and putting them in the Golf, which was
parked in the vicinity of Jovanovic's car Peugeot 605. A group
was waiting for Jovanovic to come out of Dan's editorial offices
and then fired 16 shots at him, shortly after which he died.



CSI Podgorica

--------------




10. (U) The Deputy of the Higher State Prosecutor, Ljiljana
Klikovac, who handled the indictment, stated that forensic
experts from Wiesbaden, Germany concluded that gunpowder
particles from the shells collected at the crime scene
correspond to particles found on the left and right sleeves of

PODGORICA 00000002 003 OF 004


the defendant. Also, the defendant's DNA samples and
fingerprints, mixed with those of others, were found in the Golf
3, on the second automatic rifle (found in the car but not used
for firing at Jovanovic),and on an empty can of "Red Bull"
found, some days after the murder, in the vicinity of the Golf.
The Deputy Prosecutor announced that charges will be also
pressed against witnesses who tried to provide an alibi for
Mandic, by stating that at the time of murder they were with
him. She stated that "those claims and attempts to provide a
false alibi for Damir Mandic" were refuted by statements of a
telecommunication expert, who, on the basis of the mobile
telephone listings, established that the defendant's location at
the time of murder was other than that stated by defendant's
witnesses. The Deputy Prosecutor also put forward that Mandic
had suddenly changed his travels plan: instead of traveling to
Paris on June 5 and 6, 2004, for which he had reserved air
tickets, he suddenly left for Belgrade, knowing that the police
were looking for him and that his brother had been apprehended
for questioning.



Defense Lawyers Allege Police Misconduct

--------------




11. (U) The lawyers for Damir Mandic, Zeljko Jocic and Velibor
Markovic, stated that "key evidence", namely the "Red Bull"
beverage container and an empty plastic bag of snacks, were
furtively taken from Mandic's personal vehicle (confiscated by
police after the murder) and later planted near the place where
Golf was parked. They added that by comparison of the official
police minutes with notes kept by the experts of the Forensic
Institute of Wiesbaden it can be seen that "those pieces of
evidence" were not among those originally submitted to the lab.



Purported Accomplices Questioned, Released

--------------




12. (U) During the investigation police informally accused Vuk
Vulevic and Armin Musa Osmanagic being accomplices in the
murder, however, criminal charges against them have never been
brought. (Note: Both are also suspects in the August 2005 murder
of Montenegrin police chief Scekic - Ref B.) The police
investigation failed to disclose possible motives for the murder
or those who had masterminded it. According to the press, police
built the case on the statement by Damir Mandic made immediately
after the arrest in which he supposedly disclosed to police all
details relevant to the murder. Mandic denied his purported
statement to police and defended himself during the trial by
remaining silent.



Family Asked for Dismissal of Judge

--------------




13. (U) The trial lasted for about two years, with Judge Radovan
Mandic replacing Radomir Ivanovic. The family of Dusko Jovanovic
accused the ruling elite in Montenegro of murdering Jovanovic,
proposing that the key political figures be summoned to the
court, which was not accepted. Family and lawyers of Dusko
Jovanovic accused Judge Mandic of favoring the defendant and
cited his connections to previous verdicts of a "suspicious
nature." Their motions to have Judge Mandic dismissed were
rejected.



Judge Mandic Rules Evidence Insufficient on Murder Charge

-------------- --------------




14. (U) On December 27, Judge Mandic ruled there was no reliable
evidence that Damir Mandic participated in the murder of Dusko
Jovanovic. He explained that there was no valid evidence that
Mandic had ordered and bought a VW Golf 3 using his mobile
phone, or that he tinted the windows of the car. He added that

PODGORICA 00000002 004 OF 004


there is no reliable evidence that he purchased two automatic
rifles. Speaking about the location of Damir Mandic in the time
of Jovanovic's murder, Judge Mandic stated that there were only
presumptions that he was in the Golf 3 at that time. According
to judge's explanation, several witnesses have confirmed
Mandic's alibi.



Conviction for Kidnapping

--------------




15. (U) Mandic was sentenced to two years in jail for the 2002
kidnapping of Miodrag Nikolic, who coincidentally was the target
of an attempted assassination in late December in Serbia. The
trial was joined to that on charges of plotting to murder
Jovanovic. Mandic was released on December 27 from the prison
unit in Spuz, credited with time served.
FERRILL