The municipal prosecutor has requested the opening of a criminal investigation into the April 9 incident, before the municipal court in Zabalj. The prosecutor assessed that the underlying crime was that of damaging someone else’s belongings (article 176 (3) of the Serbian Penal Code).151 The racist statement made during the commission of the crime indicates that Ilic’s actions were motivated by ethnic hatred, at least in part.

Djurdjevo, March 19 and March 29, 2004: “Jasmin” Pastry-Shop

In the March and April, 2004, the “Jasmin” pastry shop in the center of Djurdjevo was attacked on at least three separate occasions. One person was given a ten-day sentence for a public order misdemeanor relating to the attacks. No one was prosecuted in the criminal courts. According to the owner, E.H., a Macedonian-born ethnic Albanian, the shop has been vandalized dozens of times over the past decade.152

On the evening of March 19 or in the early hours of March 20, 2004, in the aftermath of the March 17 violence in Kosovo, two young men from Djurdjevo, Robert Szabo, an ethnic Hungarian, and Marinko Stankovic, an ethnic Serb, allegedly smashed the windows and the display case in the pastry shop.153 The alleged perpetrators, who were facing misdemeanor proceedings for other offenses committed during the same month, fled Serbia and Montenegro a few weeks after these events.154 On March 29, at around 1 a.m., another person harassed E.H.. Referring to the March 29 incident, E.H. told Human Rights Watch:

This guy was 21 years old, and I know that his last name is Savic. He came to my store with Szabo and Stankovic, asked that I raise three fingers [a traditional Serb salute] and cursed my “Albanian mother.” I used cell-phone to call the police in Zabalj, five kilometers from here. The police told me that they could not come, because they were facing gasoline restrictions. They said that I pass them the guy, and they told him on the cell phone that he should leave. But he stayed. So I called the police again. This time they came and arrested him. The next day, I came to the misdemeanor judge’s office in Zabalj to testify. The judge was a male Hungarian. The proceeding was for the insults Savic uttered. He claimed that I was cursing his Serbian mother the previous night. The two youths, who damaged my shop ten days earlier, told the misdemeanor judge that they could not remember what Savic said, because they were too drunk. So the judge released him.155

On March 31, 2004, the misdemeanor judge in Zabalj found twenty-three year old Dalibor Savic guilty of threats against life, insults and use of violence (article 6, paragraphs 2-3, of the Public Order and Peace Act), and sentenced him to a ten-day imprisonment. The decision confirms that on March 29 Savic spoke an ethnic obscenity to E.H. and threatened to “slaughter” him.156

Novi Sad, May 3, 2004: Adventist Church

Buildings belonging to the Adventist Church are the most frequently targeted religious sites in Serbia. Between January and June 2005, church representatives registered eight incidents, in various locations, in which the perpetrators painted threatening messages or broke church windows.157 In most cases, the attackers have not been identified.

In one case, an Adventist priest was attacked. On May 3, 2004, after the evening service at the Adventist Church in Novi Sad, three intoxicated students harassed the priests and worshippers. Around 9 p.m., twenty-year old student Rade Tomanovic arrived by taxi to the neighborhood, purportedly to visit his friend who lives nearby. Tomanovic saw worshippers leaving the service, and asked them whether they were a “sect.” One woman testified in the later misdemeanor proceedings how she tried to explain to Tomanovic that the Adventists were not a sect.158 As Tomanovic spoke with loud voice, a senior priest who passed by told him to lower his voice.159 Tomanovic then got angry and grabbed the priest, Ljubisa Stajic, by the throat.160 According to the priest, Tomanovic insulted him and a group of worshippers, “We should chase away you sectarians and burn and break all this!”161 Other persons on the site demanded that Tomanovic leave, and somebody in the group pushed him. Tomanovic fell and banged his head against the wall.162 He stepped out to the yard, only to come back a moment later with two friends—Drazen Knezevic and Rade Karadzic, both twenty-years old. Both men were drunk. All three insulted and threatened the worshippers.163 The police arrived soon after and arrested the offenders.

Misdemeanor proceedings were brought against Tomanovic and his friends the following day. Tomanovic was sentenced to seven days’ imprisonment, for disruption of public order and peace by means of “insulting or abusing other persons, using violence, provoking brawl or participating therein” (article 6(3) of Public Order and Peace Act).164 Knezevic and Karadzic were ordered to pay 1,000 dinars each (U.S. $17) – the maximum fine prescribed by the law for this misdemeanor.165
Becej, June 6, 2004: S.P. and K.K.

According to a Serbian police report submitted to the U.S. Congress by the Serbian government, seventeen-year old S.P. and seventeen-year old K.K. were attacked on June 6, 2004 by a group of young men in Becej.166 According to police report, the intoxicated attackers used ethnic slurs against Hungarians both before and during their attack on S.P. and K.K.167 Police found the perpetrators, and brought criminal charges against eighteen-year old Radovan Popovic, nineteen-year old Dragan Radivojevic, as well as misdemeanor charges against a fifteen-year old.

S.P. and K.K. told Human Rights Watch that they were attacked some time after midnight, on their way home to the nearby town of Novi Becej. They were discussing whether they should return to a gathering of motorcycle riders in Becej, which they attended earlier that evening. K.K., who is from a mixed Serb-Hungarian family but attends a Hungarian-language school, explained what happened next:

A group of young people was standing just next to the road. They must have heard us speaking in Hungarian, because we were riding our bicycles slowly and we were talking loudly. One of them said “Hey, Hungarians, wait!” We did not stop. We had never seen those guys before. One of them then ran in our direction and said “Wait, do you have a watch? What time is it?” Before I was able to respond, he kicked S.[P.] and S. fell. I managed to run away, some fifty meters from there. I looked back and saw how three or four guys were beating S. There was a man there who was taking water from a well, and I asked for his help. The man then started walking toward the assailants. They let S. go.168

S.P. stated during the investigation that the attackers repeatedly uttered ethnic slurs, including: “(*)(*)(*)(*) your Hungarian mother!”; “What are you doing here?” and; “Go home!,” during the beating.169 He could not see how many people attacked him, because he was busy trying to protect his head. As a result of the beating, he sustained serious bruises on his face and other injuries.170

The municipal prosecutor in Becej charged Dragan Radivojevic with the crime of violent behavior (article 220 of the Serbian Penal Code). On December 8, 2004, the municipal court in Becej gave Radivojevic a suspended one-year prison sentence, which he will not have to serve unless he commits another offense in the next two years.171 One of the defendants, who was a minor at the time of the incident, was tried on the same charges on December 23, 2004. The court ordered the minor, who is fatherless, to be placed under intensified supervision by the guardianship agency.172 The Basic Penal Code provides this correctional measure as a sanction against law-breaking minors.

The presiding judge in the case against Dragan Radivojevic told Human Rights Watch that the two-year time period in which Radivojevic has to abstain from committing crimes in order to avoid serving the prison sentence is an exceptionally harsh requirement given that the defendant had no criminal record (he had, however, been subject to misdemeanor proceedings). According to the judge: “I nevertheless decided [the sentence] in that way, because it seemed to me that Radivojevic acted out of nationalistic motives.”173 The fact that the judge regarded the suspended sentence as an exceptionally harsh one underscores the need for a perception shift among the judiciary about the seriousness of hate crimes offenses.

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Jesus beat the devil with two sticks. Colossian 2:13,15

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