The High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council (HJPC) has confirmed the second-instance decision imposing a sanction on Aida Topalovic, a prosecutor at the Cantonal Prosecutor's Office in Sarajevo. The sanction involves a 30% salary reduction for a period of six months due to the offense of "negligence or carelessness in performing official duties" related to a case involving harassment and threats to a woman who was later murdered.

The Council rejected Topalovic's appeal as unfounded and upheld the decision of the Second-Instance Disciplinary Commission.

The decision states that the Council considers the disciplinary measure imposed to be adequate and appropriate to the nature and severity of the disciplinary offense, its consequences, the circumstances of its execution, and the established level of Topalović's disciplinary responsibility. It also believes that the sanction will achieve the purpose and objectives of disciplinary action.

In April of this year, the First-Instance Disciplinary Commission found Topalovic responsible for, in her capacity as deputy chief cantonal prosecutor, failing to take any official action after receiving and assigning the case formed on October 23, 2020, regarding the criminal offense of endangering safety against H.E. On November 4, 2020, she issued an order not to conduct an investigation against the reported person and marked the case as “closed” in the CMS, without taking any official action to verify the allegations in the police report.

The decision states that Topalovic failed to perform a key action—hearing the victim—as well as other evidentiary actions, and even after receiving new reports and operational materials, she consciously did not take any official actions to verify the new allegations.

According to the decision of the First-Instance Disciplinary Commission, on December 5, 2020, the victim, K.J., was shot by the reported H.E., after which she died on December 14. H.E. was subsequently found guilty of murder by a final verdict.

The First-Instance Disciplinary Commission then imposed a sanction of a 30% salary reduction for six months, which was confirmed by the Second-Instance Disciplinary Commission on June 25 of this year.

The final decision of the HJPC, as well as the decisions of the First-Instance and Second-Instance Disciplinary Commissions, were published in an anonymized form. However, based on the disciplinary case number and factual description, Detektor can confirm that the decision relates to Topalovic.