The determination of individual responsibility of an individual for war crimes against humanity and international law committed during the World War II, after more than 50 years from concrete events is rare in the legal practice of the world today.

After having established the existence of a founded suspicion that Dinko Ljubomir Sakic allegedly committed such criminal offences as the commander of Jasenovac camp on the territory of the "Independent State of Croatia" of that time, the investigation judge of this court Zdenko Konji_ issued a decree on April 21, 1998 in which it was decided, upon the request of the County State’s Attorney in Zagreb, that investigation would be carried out against Dinko Ljubomir Sakic based on the founded suspicion that he committed a criminal offence, war crime against civilian population form Article 120, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Criminal Law of the Republic of Croatia.

Since this court has issued such an act, and since Dinko Ljubomir Sakic was in Argentina, his extradition was requested, for the purposes of the carrying out of criminal proceedings, and the Republic of Argentina positively responded to this request.

Dinko Ljubomir Sakic was extradited to the judicial authorities of the Republic of Croatia on June 18, 1998, and has been in detention since then.

Attorney-at-law Ivan Kern, joined in the later phase of the trial by attorney-at-law Branko Seric, defended the accused Dinko Ljubomir Sakic as defense counsels appointed by the court, because he did not choose them himself, but he only agreed with their appointment as defense counsels.

Upon the termination of investigation the County State’s Attorney filed indictment with this court on December 14, 1998, charging the accused Sakic with the commission of the criminal offence of war crime against civilian population from Article 120, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Criminal Law of the Republic of Croatia. The prosecution was represented at the trial by County State’s Attorney in Zagreb Radovan Santek, his Deputy Janjko Grlic, and occasionally Dunja Pavlicek-Patak.

Following the rejection of the appeal against the indictment, the indictment became final, and the trial panel scheduled the trial which was supposed to begin on March 4, 1999. Due to the health problems of the accused the trial was postponed and the court panel decided that the accused should be examined by medical court experts, and that they should answer the questions regarding his health condition and ability to follow the course of the trial. It was also decided that during the entire proceedings the accused Sakic must be under constant medical supervision and that he should be accompanied by a doctor on his way to the court and within the court, and this was done.

When the health condition of the accused stabilized, the trial began on March 15, 1999 by reading the indictment and it lasted since that date continuously, with small breaks, for 56 trial days.

During this period, after the accused stated that he did not feel guilty, a proceedings of presentation of evidence was carried out during which the court heard testimonies of 34 witnesses at the trial. Also, following a concurrent motion of the parties the court read the minutes from investigation on hearing testimonies of 5 witnesses and minutes from investigation and testimonies given out of the trial for 2 witnesses. During the proceedings for presentation of evidence, the content of the documentation regarding which the panel decided to be presented as evidence was presented, and the said documentation was examined and shown on the big screen in the courtroom.

The accused presented his defense on three occasions, first time for 3 days regarding the content of the indictment as it had been originally laid down, and later on two occasions he supplemented his defense after the state’s attorney had amended the text of the indictment.

After the court had heard all available evidence, in accordance with its decision, the proceedings for the presentation of evidence was terminated on September 20, 1999, after which the parties, in accordance with legally established order, presented their closing arguments.

After the termination of their closing arguments, rebuttals and answers to rebuttals, and after the last statement given by the accused when he stated that "his conscience is clean and that he feels no remorse" the president of the panel announced that the trial against Dinko Ljubomir Sakic for criminal offence of war crime against civilian population was terminated therewith on September 29, 1999 at 1:50 p.m., and that the panel would withdraw to deliberate and vote.

On the same occasion the president of the panel announced that the announcement of the judgement will be on October 4, 1999 at 12:00 noon.

This terminated the substantial part of the trial which has the objective to establish individual responsibility of an individual for his acts for which he is charged as having committed criminal offence.

A court panel has an extremely difficult task during the proceedings of deliberation. It is up to the court panel to decide whether there is a need to supplement the proceedings for presentation of evidence and to decide on preliminary issues (called so by the law), and subsequently to decide on the substance of the case (called so by the law).

The deciding on the "substance of the case" means that the court first decides whether the accused is guilty as charged in indictment or not, and if the panel establishes his guilt, it decides on the punishment and other issues on which decision must be made.

In deciding these matters the panel must be guided by its professional knowledge, its conscience and its honesty and decide on the basis of the procedure that was carried out, without any outside influence.

In this moment we can not and may not state our opinion about the possible decision of the panel, in order to avoid stepping in the zone of criminal responsibility, namely in order to avoid the commission of criminal offence from Article 309 of the Criminal Law "coercion against judicial official" which states in Paragraph 2 as follows:

"(2) Any person who, during the proceedings before the court, and before a final judicial decision is passed, in public media, at a public gathering or before a gathering of people presents his or her opinion how the judicial official should act in a particular case or what kind of decisions he or she should pass shall be punished by a fine in the amount up to hundred and fifty daily incomes or by imprisonment up to six months."

The Supreme Court of the Republic of Croatia has the right to control the judgement of this court if an appeal is filed by a party unsatisfied by the judgement.

I am convinced that the court panel shall pass a just and correct judgement, no matter how appropriate we will deem it to be. The guarantee for such an opinion is the course of the proceedings itself which was carried out before the court panel of this court presided by judge of this court Drazen Tripalo, and composed of the judges of this court Sonja Breskovic Balent and Mirjana Magud, and lay judges Zoran Prendivoj, Mira Gaspar, Veljko Zednik and Anka Pem, and to which acts in this proceedings neither of the parties in the proceedings has any serous objections.

Also, I am convinced that the media will, in the same way in which they did during the proceedings so far, only with small exceptions, present the decision of the court panel with objective commentaries, without engaging in the common political speculations.

In the case the court panel does not decide that it is necessary to present additional evidence, and in the case it makes a judgement on October 4, 1999, in which it decides whether the accused Dinko Ljubomir Sakic is guilty or not, and if his is guilty, which is the sanction appropriate to the degree of his guilt, then this is our last meeting, and I would like to repeat the statement I made earlier that in this proceedings, with minor exceptions, the media demonstrated a high degree of professionalism and objectivity in the informing of general public about the events at the trial.

DEPUTY PRESIDENT OF THE COURT
Damir Kos