The mother of David Dragicevic, a 21-year-old whose unsolved murder has sparked months-long mass protests in Bosnia’s Serb-majority part, said she was questioned by police after she posted what appears to be an audio recording of a conversation between Bosnia’s Presidency Chairman and a pathologist who worked on her son’s case on social media.
The recording emerged on the ‘Justice for David’ Facebook group on Wednesday and police summoned Suzana Radanovic to see whether she has made it illegally.
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She said she responded and that she received the recording from someone else who recorded it on the street.
Police found the lifeless body of David Dragicevic, 21, in a river near Banja Luka, the administrative centre of Republika Srpska (RS), Bosnia’s Serb-dominated semi-autonomous entity, in March 2018.
Pathologist Zeljko Karan a few days later said at a press conference the cause of death was likely drowning, and that David had taken drugs.
The conference sparked protests, especially after another autopsy performed on David’s body showed a different time of death. The case was later reclassified into murder.
Led by David’s father, Davor Dragicevic, who believes police and prosecutors in the RS are hiding the killers, citizens have organised into the Justice for David group and have been protesting at the central Krajina Square in Banja Luka since March.
The protest culminated on Christmas day when police scuffled with citizens who tried to prevent officers from detaining David’s father and mother, several of their supporters and a number of RS opposition politicians.
The police operation was strongly criticised by the opposition, NGO’s and international organisations such as the OSCE, and the European Union, whose Special Representative in Bosnia, Lars-Gunnar Wigemark, called upon RS authorities to “show restraint”.
Dragicevic and Radanovic were later released.
The audio recording which emerged this week allegedly involves Karan and the current Chairman and Serb member of Bosnia’s tripartite Presidency, Milorad Dodik.
Dodik has for years been either Prime Minister or President of the RS, and his party, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD), is still in power in the entity.
The SNSD has accused opposition politicians of hijacking the Justice for David movement for political purposes, while the movement is holding Dodik and his political circles responsible for backing the RS Interior Minister, Dragan Lukac, who the protesters claim is corrupt.
In the recording, it appears as if Karan and Dodik are discussing the Justice for David group and arranging a meeting.
Radanovic told reporters on Wednesday that she received the recording and was not the one to record it.
“It happened on public property, so let them check whatever they want. They will not break me, nor scare me,” she said.
Despite a police ban, the Justice for David group has been protesting in Banja Luka daily.
Davor Dragicevic is meanwhile missing since Sunday evening.
Police have on Monday issued an arrest warrant for him and four others over the gatherings, which also disrupted a New Year’s event that was supposed to take place in Banja Luka.
“I don’t know anything about Davor. Police is looking for him. To whom should I report him missing? I also reported David missing, and they didn’t find him,” she said.
The protest over the death of David has also drawn support from other cities in Bosnia and the regions, most notably from Sarajevo, where another father has been organising protests over the controversial death of his son for two years.
Muriz Memic, the father of 21-year-old Dzenan Memic who died in 2016, has been protesting over what he believes is a cover-up of his son's murder by Sarajevo's judiciary.
Dragicevic and Memic were often guests at each other’s protests and were even invited for a meeting with EU ambassadors last month, who supported their efforts to find out the truth.
Memic told N1 that Davor’s disappearance is a “catastrophe”.
Although local media reported on Sunday that Davor Dragicevic was detained, RS police denied it.
“What could have happened? I don’t believe that Davor would leave without notifying anyone, just like that. Davor would never disappear and leave those people standing at the square,” Memic said.
