For Murder Dial 92

The Belgrade Police Department considers the triple murder of Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan, Midrag Mandic and Dragan Garic essentially solved.  Chiefs of the Criminal Investigations Department (Colonel Milenko Ercic) and of the Homicide Department (Lieutenant Colonel Mijodrag Gutic) of the Belgrade Police Department announced on Saturday, January 22 that they found and arrested the man suspected of murder as well as to suspected accomplices who assisted in the flight from the scene of the crime.  Two of those arrested were long time employees of the Belgrade Police Department.  "In assisting the investigation," journalists were not told who organized and commissioned this crime, although Colonel Eric stated that it is "significant that the event itself has been investigated and that it's origins are in the crime world, despite all other suppositions, insinuations and manipulations."  It has not been revealed whether the murderer had an assistant in the Intercontinental Hotel itself, as well as where the murder weapon is.  The description of the flight of the assassins from the scene of the crime raises the most questions.  According to the police description, the flight was carried out with such incompetence that the actual murderer was in police hands only hours after the crime was committed.  Still, the most serious question raised by such a development of events is the nature of the relationship between the police and the underground world.

Police representatives told journalists that Dobrosav Gavric, age 23, residing in the village of Trbusnica near Loznica has been arrested and is suspecting of shooting and killing Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan, Midrag Mandic and Dragan Garic.  According to the police, behind bars are also Dejan Pitulic, age 33, residing in Belgrade, and Vujadin Krstic, age 36, residing in Loznica, both suspected of acting as accomplices.  According to the official version, Gavric was wounded in the reception area of the Intercontinental Hotel by one of Raznatovic's bodyguards, who is presently not in Belgrade, according to the police.  Pitulic drove Gavric in his red Volkswagen Golf to a doctor, Milos Vasiljevic who has a private orthopedic practice in Loznica.  They were waited upon there by Krstic.  Dr. Vasiljevic advised them to take the wounded man to the main hospital in Loznica.  Gavric was driven to hospital by Vujadin Krstic.  He was operated on there and is presently "safely guarded," according to the police.  Lieutenant Colonel Gutic stated that "investigation results are not final," while Colonel Eric stated that the accused admitted to the crime, but that police work "is based on evidence, and not on mere admissions."  "The job of the police is by no means at an end with this...  We have information about the motives for the crime, but it is not our practice to interfere with the investigation," Colonel Ercic stated.

At the press conference given by the Belgrade Police Department, it was also announced that Dobrosav Gavric had graduated from the Police Academy in 1996 and worked in Police Brigade with the Belgrade Police Department.  Since June of last year he has been on sick leave.  According to Colonel Ercic, since that time "he has been working as a bodyguard for some of Belgrade's top criminals."  Dejan Pitulic has been a policeman since 1989.  He worked in the On-Duty Section of the Belgrade Police Department.  Last year he was fired on June 5 for "abusing his position and offering bodyguard services to persons from the world of crime."  "He was arrested in March of last year precisely because of such activities and because of his connections with criminals," stated Colonel Ercic.  Vujadin Krstic was not a policeman, but was "well known by the police for some time now for committing serious offenses, because of which he was sentenced in court."  Colonel Ercic denied insinuations that any of the suspects were members of Arkan's elite Serbian Volunteer Guard and that Gavric shook Raznatovic's hand prior to killing him.  It remains unclear whether anyone shook hands with Raznatovic prior to the triple homicide and whether this has anything to do with the assassination in any way.  "Who was with Gavric in the reception area of the Hotel we are unable to tell, although we are in possession of certain information," stated Colonel Ercic.  It was emphasized that the police is continuing its investigation of this case in order to apprehend everyone who was in any way connected with this crime.

Dobrosav Gavric is no longer in the main hospital in Loznica.  A helicopter came to pick him up last Saturday around 8 p.m.  Around fifteen minutes past eight, the police blocked off streets around the hospital in a radius of 150 meters, while an ambulance transported Gavric from the hospital to a nearby stadium, where the helicopter was waiting.  It is supposed that Gavric is presently in Belgrade, either in the prison hospital or in the Military Health Academy.  Miodrag Paunovic, Investigating Judge with the Belgrade Circuit Court is scheduled to interrogate him and the other two suspects this week.  Since Monday, the Politika daily received reliable information that the suspects were presented before the investigating judge during the weekend and that he sent them to prison for thirty days "without interrogating them."  The Circuit Public Prosecutor filed a demand for an investigation on Monday, but Judge Paunovic is unable to process this demand until he interrogates the suspects.  At the time that this text is being written, the latest information from the Politika daily is that the suspects were also not interrogated on Tuesday because "procedure was not finished" for this to happen.  When asked to comment, Judge Paunovic stated: "I will not give any statements regarding this case."  Previously he was quoted in the Glas Javnosti daily, last Friday, where he stated that he is not at all in charge of this case.

On Tuesday, the Novosti daily published segments of the Autopsy Report which we were told by Dr. Slobodan Kovacevic, Director of the Institute for Forensic Medicine, was sent to Judge Paunovic on January 17.  The Autopsy Report indicates that Raznatovic was shot with three bullets in the back of the head, slightly to one side.  Mandic was killed from four shots to the back, while two bullets were discovered in Dragan Garic's body.  All of these bullets are 9 mm PARA caliber and were fired from a distance of five feet or a little more.  Dobrosav Garic, the assailant, was hit with a 7.65 mm caliber bullet which was fired by one of Raznatovic's bodyguards.

Before praising the police for their speediness and efficiency, it might not be amiss to ask several questions.  The first question which poses itself is: why the accomplices did not liquidate Gavric when it became clear that his identity will lead the police on their trail?  Had they killed him, stuffed him in a bag full of stones and thrown him in the Drina River, his body would most likely be discovered in the Spring and he might even have been identified by the summer, while the accomplices would have been discovered on April Fool's Day.  Perhaps they did not even know where and how Gavric was actually wounded?  Secondly, it is completely unclear how in the planing of the assassination of a figure like Arkan, the possibility of the assassin being wounded was completely ignored: Gavric was driven to Loznica, which is two hours away when driving and loss of time in exchanging vehicles are taken into account; he went to a doctor who operated on him half a year ago, when he was wounded in the leg ("According to his testimony that was a self- inflicted wound, although we believe that it was the result of an encounter within the circle of people Gavric associated with," Colonel Eric states), which was logical at the time, given that the doctor is an orthopedist, but in this case Dr. Vasiljevic was not sufficiently qualified - Gavric's inner organs were wounded; Gavric is known by everyone in Loznica and his family lives there, so that elementary logic would lead him to the conclusion that this is the last place he should show up shortly after the murder, and let alone to come and seek medical help!  Perhaps it was planned that the assassins would flee to Republika Srpska, but they had to change plans because the police had already blocked all border crossings, with a wounded man being too apparent?

Thirdly, the question poses itself why did Pitulic remain in Serbia when he was so close to Republika Srpska and knew that through Gavric the police could easily get to him, which is exactly what happened.  During his arrest in Kragujevac, Pitulic gave his licence to the traffic police without suspecting anything, even though he evidently drove the same Volkswagen Golf in which he is supposed to have driven Gavric to Loznica.  Fourthly, as his wife states for the daily newspapers, Vujadin Krstic gave his full name to the hospital personnel after he dropped of Gavric in the hospital in Loznica, which means that he was not hiding.  Such behavior on Pitulic's and Krstic's part could be considered irresponsible, except if they had no inkling of an idea surrounding Gavric's wounding.  Or they might have placed their trust in a powerful patron.  According to Krstic's mother, her son was arrested by the police on Sunday, January 16, one day after the murder, only to be released on Wednesday.  He was again asked to come to the police station again on Friday, January 21 before 7 p.m., which he did in an orderly fashion.

It is also interesting that only three days after the assassination, the Politika daily reported that one of the suspected assassins from the reception desk of the Intercontinental Hotel is located in a hospital outside of Belgrade, while other newspapers stated that his is located in a hospital in Loznica and that his name is Dragan Gavric.  The mistake in the name probably arose because Gavric presented himself as Dragan Glisic.  Both the regime and the opposition newspapers agreed at the time that the wounded man was not the assassin but his accomplice: according to the initial version, only one man shot Raznatovic, Mandic and Garic, but a different man was shot at the exit door to the Intercontinental Hotel, having taken flight together with the actual killer.  The Tuesday, January 18 headline in Politika read: "Seriously Wounded Accomplice Operated On, Killer Still on the Loose."  However, at the police press conference the wounded accomplice was "promoted" into the actual assassin.

The police claims that beside the confessions given by the suspects, there is also material evidence: several vehicles used during the flight were discovered.  In one of them "there is sufficient blood to identify the wounded assassin."  If it is true that the wounded assassin had literally crawled out of the Intercontinental Hotel, it is certain that the traces of blood on the reception area floor are sufficient for identification.  However, the police did not mention this at all.  There is also no news whether a "paraffin glove" test was conducted on the first suspect for powder burn marks, although it was publicly stated that the murder weapon had not been discovered.

At the press conference there was no mention the Belgrade resident Dragan Vujovic who was supposedly arrested with Pitulic on Thursday at the Ravni Gaj motel in Kragujevac.  Vujovic was released on Saturday and it is still not clear whether his is connected with the assassination and in what way.  He is most frequently associated with interrogations relating to arrests of Belgrade businessmen who have been experiencing financial difficulties in recent times.  There is also no official news regarding  the arrest of a certain Branko Jeftovic (initially newspapers reported that his name is Goran) who was arrested in Subotica, according to unofficial information.

There are also rumors that three well known Belgrade criminals with nicknames Miki, Gagi and Zoran, who are thought to have been accomplices (or even organizers) of the triple murder in the Intercontinental Hotel, had managed to flee into Republika Srpska through Loznica.  According to this version, their Audi 8 was left behind in Loznica.  Republika Srpska Ministry of Internal Affairs Spokesman Zoran Glusic claims that no "request for action" had come in from Serbia until Friday, January 21.  If the story about Miki, Gagi and Zoran is correct, they probably did not stay for long in Republika Srpska.  Knowing who the arrested suspects worked for and that this man went abroad recently, relying also on persistent claims by the press that the assassination was planed in a house in Borska Street, the Belgrade grapevine is aware who these insinuations are pointing to.  As the Novosti daily reports, this person is among the first to have put a death notice in the newspaper lamenting Arkan's death and calling him "brother."

Simple arithmetic indicates that of two of the three people killed were policemen: at a trial some fifteen years ago, Raznatovic entered his profession as "member of the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs," which he confirmed verbally at the time; Dragan Garic worked for the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs right up to his death.  Among the three suspects for their murder there is one ex- policeman and one active policeman.  Therefore, between the six of them, four of them were policemen.  At the same time, the regime media are triumphant in their attacks on the opposition (which keeps claiming that this is state terrorism and that the police is behind it all), and conclude that it is clear to everyone that this was simply a settling of scores in the underground world.

However, these two claims are not mutually exclusive.  Namely, even during the former SFRY, may God rest its soul, the State Security Service hired confirmed criminals for "activities against unfriendly emigration" to the West.  Upon their return to the country in the late eighties, early nineties, a new role was found for a goon number of them in various paramilitary formations: they got weapons, uniforms and authorizations, and in return they offered their already existing "criminal" organization as the nucleus for all such formations.  "Winning fame" on various battle fields through looting and various misdeeds, these newfangled "patriots" and "war heros" acquired important political-police protection and connections.  These people began various, profitable "businesses" in Serbia, unhindered by anyone or anything: cigarette and gasoline smuggling, gambling, restaurants, stolen automobiles, dealing in foreign currency, exclusive boutiques, rackets...  Efficiency in making money, regardless of the way in which it was done, became the only criterion for entering the club of the privileged and the untouchable.  The only line which could not be crossed was political loyalty to the government.  Arkan was certainly the best known individual from that world, but was by no means the only one.

Their way of life also had serious implications for the police.  On many occasions, in the name of a "higher power," members of the MUP had to turn their head the other way in situations which under normal conditions they would certainly intervene.  Corruption prone individuals saw that working for "criminals" was a certain way to success, to a life of money, luxury, pleasure, beautiful women...  For them, working in the police became an exclusive way of gathering useful information, abusing colleagues and various other abuses offered by police badges and weapons.  All that was tied in with personal risks that were by no means small.  There were many deaths in the restaurants and streets of Belgrade without the perpetrators and those who commissioned the murders ever having been discovered.  And it was not only the criminals who got killed.  Unsolved assassinations include such figures as a MUP general (as well as deputy minister of internal affairs), two colonels, one inspector and one authorized official.  Were those policemen killed because they tried to stand in the way of organized crime or were they members of criminal lobbies who fell in the settling of scores.

Beside the existence of organized crime, with the corrupt relationship between the criminals and the police being an integral part of this, members of the police were also negatively influenced by their use in activities for which they were not trained and because of which they did not chose their professions.  In the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo, policemen frequently discovered through lawlessness, looting and the suffering of civilians, how cheap human life can be, and how freely other people's property can be stolen.  Political misuse of the police, such as for battering peaceful demonstrators, created a type of policeman that was described by MUP Captain Slobodan Pajic (returned his medal to the FRY President) in the following way: "People come to the police because they think this is an easy job - you listen to what you are told, you do not think about your actions or their consequences, you get paid and you don't worry about a thing."

Just as there are spies among journalists, smugglers among truckers and sailors, pyromaniacs among firemen, in the same way policemen can come under the influence of the crime world and can become hired killers.  That is why the case of Gavric and Pitulic might not mean anything; there is no police force in the world where there aren't any "rotten apples."  However, until the entire background of the Arkan case is uncovered and substantiated with facts - from the businesses and activities of the deceased, to the person who commissioned the murder and his motives for the murder - "speculations, insinuations and manipulations about state terrorism," as Colonel Ercic put it, will not be convincingly refuted in the eyes of the majority of the public.

There is one angle from which the results of the investigation appear completely logical.  There are many people in our police force who work for criminals when they are on the sick leave from their police work, while the police has been unable to solve some ten murders for many years now, murders which were carried out professionally in the capital city, with some of the victims having themselves been policemen.  If such a job description for policemen is kept in mind, it is completely logical that after the most inept flight after a hired killing in the past ten years, it is precisely policemen who are suspects.  In any case, who knows if the investigation would have yielded any results had Raznatovic's bodyguard not managed to wound the assailant.

Criminal Minded Policemen

It is a well known fact that some of our policemen are hardly what one could call daisies - it is not infrequently that one of them gets drunk in a restaurant, kills his friend, shoots his own wife, or even his godfather.  However, there are cases on record where policemen attempted (and in some cases succeeded) to carry out a hired killing.

The most famous such case happened in January of 1993.  At that time, having learned his lesson from earlier, Goran Vukovic, aka Monkey, the man who killed the legendary Ljuba Zemunac and who lead the Vozdovac Clan at that time, an individual who had a contract on his head and lived through several assassination attempts - well, he took an unusual path in getting to his favorite disco club called Love.  He and his friend, Mirsad Jovanovic, went through a little park so that they would approach potential assassins from behind.  Caution proved justified - the two of them surprised two members of the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs, Radojica Dozic and Milovan Zoric, who were lying in ambush.  In the gun fight, Vukovic and Dozic were wounded, and Zoric managed to flee.  The investigation was carried out somehow.  The superior officer of the two policemen, Mirko Jokic, distanced himself from the activities of his men through the newspapers, while Dozic returned to the police force after Vukovic's murder in December of 1994.
What happened on August 1, 1995 is even more fascinating.  At that time Zoran Djordjevic, Bojan Milosavljvic, Miodrag Prodanovic and Nenad Dragisic arrived at dawn to the village of Brnjice near Golupci, each one wearing a black mask.  In front of the restaurant "Chez Moma", sat Moma Romanovic and policeman Veljko Mirosavljvic after all the guest had left the restaurant.  Moma Romanovic, the owner of the establishment was better known as the Danube Sheik because of his involvement in gasoline smuggling across the Danube river, and policeman Veljko Mirosavljevic, who worked part-time for Romanovic as his body guard, was better known as Tyson.  The four masked assassins opened fire, wounding Tyson critically, and forcing Romanovic to take out two bags from his jeep, one with 3,930 German Marks, and another with 1,710 American dollars, and to hand them over.  While trying to flee, their car got stuck in the mud.  They tried to set it on fire, dousing the front seats with some oil, but as one of the said later in court, "The sucker didn't wanna burn."

Giving up on the car and all attempts at covering up their tracks, the foursome headed on foot to the railway station Brodica on the Belgrade-Zajecar line.  There they met a single railway worker who explained to them that the train (probably the only one that day), had already left, and he advised them to go the highway and wait for the bus, which was due to arrive soon.  In the meantime they used the railway office phone, showing the confused railway worker their police badges - all four were police officers, either active or ex-policemen (Prodanovic worked in Pakrac, from where he managed to flee).  The company went to catch the bus which local police later stopped and picked up the criminals like ripe apples.

During the investigation, the police found some of the arsenal used in the attack: two automatic guns "Heckler und Koch" and a hand gun manufactured by the Spanish factory Star.  The perpetrators of this crime did not even manage to get rid of their weapons - the automatic guns and pistol, which they tried to fling into the Danube from a some elevation, ended up in the bushes on the river bank.  Later it was proven that beside the Hecklers, another six guns were also used (two of which were "Zig zauers"), and a Scorpion, which happened to be in one of Romanovic's bags.  Because of serious criminal charges, Djordjevic was sentenced to six years, and the other three got five.  The Supreme Court overruled the sentences and sent the whole case to the Belgrade Circuit Court.  The case is still pending.

In the meantime it was discovered that one of the Hecklers had been used fifteen days prior to this incident in a shooting in Cafe Dumbo.  In that incident, two masked assassins killed Goran Marjanovic, aka the Bomber, and his girlfriend Marija Djordjevic, and mad an invalid of Jasmina Kovacevic, a mother of two, who accidentally happened to be in the Cafe at the time.  Rhe Regional Prosecutor's Office indicted Milosavljevic and Prodanovic in this incident shooting.  This case is also still pending.

Freelancing Policemen

According to the Rules and Regulations given to each officer of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, police officers cannot take part in activities outside of their job which are incompatible with their profession.  More precisely, policemen cannot own companies, boutiques, stores, agencies, cannot offer protection services in their spare time in securing persons and property, cannot do freelance detective work, cannot work as commercial import/export traders, or, let us say, work as taxi drivers.  On the other hand, they can go skiing, they can write books, play instruments, take care of a garden or cultivate a field and indulge in similar activities, and can even make money doing so, so long as that does not interfere with their regular duties.  But "youth and low salaries" force many policemen, such as the well known Inspector Nagib, to take part in those "incompatible activities."

One of the more popular jobs policemen do in their spare time is protecting persons and property.  They begin working as bouncers in disco clubs.  Policemen who do this job say that it requires both "balls" and a clear head, with the earnings permitting only a marginally more comfortable existence.  Outside of the police, there are very few strong, honest men who can do this job without causing problems themselves, either through the use of disproportionate force or through their need to assert themselves, or in attracting their enemies to a given disco club.  Policemen, on the other hand, are not in search of trouble which would inevitably lead to questions what it is they were doing there in the first place, while their presence, even if only in an unofficial capacity, always has a pacifying effect on various "factors of instability."  When problems do arise, they take care of them efficiently and without superfluous "choreography," which is exceptionally important to the owner who does not want his establishment getting a bad name.
Protection services from policemen are also frequently sought by business people when they need to take care of a job that includes the carrying of substantial amounts of cash (or some other valuable).  The premise is that policemen are honest, that they wont "tip off" their customer, that they are trained for this job, and what is most important, that they can carry weapons legally even when they are not on the job.  Often a businessman, if he is pleased with the services offered to him by a policeman, he will offer the latter a permanent position that is far easier and far better paid than any active duty in the Ministry of Internal Affairs.  According to VREME's sources, some policemen from Belgrade left their jobs with the Ministry and went to work as bodyguards for Serbian businessmen in the West.

For such jobs one does not seek permission from one's superior, because it is impossible to get.  "If I were to tell my chief what I do on the side, I would get the boot right away," an experienced member of the MUP tells VREME.  As far as superiors are concerned, they react in two ways to rumors about "freelancing."  Either they tolerate such activities, as long as they do not interfere with a policeman's regular duties, or they call in a policeman and give him a warning that "if he is working on the side, to stop it immediately, otherwise..."  As long as "freelancing" of ones inferiors is learned through the grapevine, a superior officer can choose the way in which to act.  Frequent considerations are low salaries, policemen's housing problems (rented apartments), frequent terms of duty in Kosovo (which were hardly a picnic), as well as what a policeman sees "undercover" can often be useful in police work.  However, if a report is submitted with a full name, disciplinary action is inevitable and it can result in a warning, in suspension or in firing.
Beside such jobs in their own profession, policemen are frequently given to classical business ventures - owning stores, cafes, restaurants.  Since they cannot register a business under their own name, the owner of choice is the wife, a close relative or a close friend (who can also be a partner in the business).  The motivation for remaining on the police force are determined by the privileges of the profession: for instance, crossing the border without having to pay any duties, or getting gasoline at gas stations at official prices.  What is not tolerated is for a company to be taking part in activities that are normally reserved for the police.  For instance, in the event a policeman's wife owns and operates an agency that offers protection services on the same territory in which her husband works, his attention will be told either to move his business elsewhere or to submit his resignations, even without the law having been officially broken by such a policeman.

What policemen intensely dislike is when a colleague works part-time for individuals that operate on the other side of the law.  Criminals have very good reasons to hire policemen.  As was noted earlier, policemen can carry weapons even when off duty, which means they can "cover" a customer who is carrying a weapon without a permit, in the event there is a police control, or what is even more useful, they can take a weapon into an area where weapons are not permitted for civilians (airport, hotel, public institution).  Of course, the information a policemen can bring from his job at the police department is hardly to be ignored.  Policemen who accept such jobs do not last for long on any police department.  Their colleagues detest them because such policemen are often employed by individuals who are police killers, and that is a line that cannot be crossed according to unwritten police rules in all countries, even when a lot of money is at stake.

Gun Salute

The funeral for Zeljko Raznatovic was held on January 20 on Belgrade's New Cemetary, with thousands of people having been in attendance.  A uniformed unit of the Serbian Volunteer Guard fired a gun salute in honor of Raznatovic in which they used automatic weapons.  VREME asked Ph.D. Jovan Buturovic, a lawyer and a former President of the Military Supreme Court, who has the right by law to carry automatic weapons, and who has the right to fire gun salutes.  "The Law on Ammunition of the Republic of Serbia stipulates that no one outside of the army and the police is permitted to carry automatic weapons," states Ph.D. Buturovic.  The only exception are "persons who are directly carrying out duties of physical protection of premises," but a firing of gun salutes can in no way be included in this category.  "Yugoslav Army Regulations stipulate who can be honored with a gun salute, what units carry out such ceremonies and how many gun salutes are permitted," Jovan Buturovic tells us.

As early as 1992, the Serbian Volunteer Guard (SDG) identified itself to the Sabac Police Department as the Reconnaissance Unit of the Novi Sad Corps of the Yugoslav Army.  The document which was used on that occasion had the signature of General Andrija Biorcevic, Commander of the Novi Sad Corps.  Is it possible that the SDG is formally recognized as a reserve unit of the Yugoslav Army of the Ministry of Internal Affairs?  "There is no distinction made in documents between regular and reserve units.  Volunteers can be accepted into the Yugoslav Army and they are subject to all military regulations.  According to regulations, SDG does not exist," states Buturovic, advising us to contact the Ministry of Internal Affairs regarding what is the SDG, why it is permitted to carry weapons and what is its purpose.  The daily newspaper Danas got the same advice from General Major Milan Simic, Chief of the Directorate for Information and Morale with the Yugoslav Army, who directed them to the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
According to the Law on Weapons and Ammunition, "unauthorized buying, possession, carrying, making, exchange or selling of firearms, ammunition or explosive devices" is a serious criminal offense carrying a prison term of six months to five years.