The Appellate Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has convened. On the agenda is the decision in the case against Milorad Dodik and Miloš Lukić. The defense of the accused requested the disqualification of two judges, the request was rejected as unfounded. The prosecution is seeking higher sentences and a conviction for Lukić, the defense said that the amendments to the Criminal Code passed by High Representative Christian Schmidt cannot be the legal basis for convictions.
The prosecution is seeking a longer prison sentence for Dodik, while they are seeking a conviction for Lukić. They believe that, in the case of Dodik, the court gave greater importance to mitigating circumstances than aggravating ones. They say that the court should have considered Dodik’s behavior during and after the trial as particularly aggravating circumstances. As for the second defendant, Lukić, they believe that the court incorrectly established the facts and that on July 7, 2023, he was appointed acting director of the Official Gazette of the RS, although he had not yet been entered in the court register.
“The first instance court should certainly have taken into account the fact of a legal institution that is very important when deciding on the type and amount of the criminal sanction to be imposed, which is the purpose of punishment as well as action in the field of special and general prevention, i.e., preventing the commission of criminal offenses,” said Gordana Bosiljčić, the prosecutor of the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The defense of the accused particularly emphasized the events of July 7, 2023, appreciating that at the time of the publication of the disputed Laws in the Official Gazette of the RS, the amendments to the Criminal Code imposed by the High Representative Christian Schmidt were not yet in force.
“We claim that on July 7, 2023, we did not have the amended Law in force due to the principles of predictability and availability because the decision was imposed without any public debate and was not previously offered for adoption by the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as was the practice of previous high representatives,” said Milorad Dodik’s lawyer Goran Bubić.
“This is a major test for the entire judiciary of Bosnia and Herzegovina, that is, very important questions will be answered about whether we respect the constitution, the law, general legal principles and whether we are legalists or not,” said Slavko Jandrić, Miloš Lukić’s lawyer.
Incidentally, the hearing was adjourned for almost three hours, because lawyer Bubić requested the disqualification of two members of the Trial Chamber, citing a violation of the Criminal Procedure Code. The request was rejected as unfounded.
“The request of the defense attorney of the accused Milorad Dodik, Goran Bubić, a lawyer from Banja Luka, for the disqualification of the members of the acting Appellate Chamber, namely Judge Vesna Jesenković in his capacity as the President of the Chamber and Judge Hilmo Vučinić in his capacity as a member of the Chamber, is rejected as unfounded,” said Vesna Jesenković, Chairwoman of the Appellate Chamber.
“We believe that this decision on the delegation is an important fact and in that sense that this request of ours made sense. But we also understand why the Court rejected it,” said Bubić.
There is now a thirty-day period in which the Appellate Chamber must issue a second-instance verdict. Recall that in the first instance, Milorad Dodik was sentenced to one year in prison and a six-year ban from holding the office of President of the Republika Srpska, while Miloš Lukić was acquitted of all charges, Federalna writes.
