The Special Prosecutor's Office for the Fight Against Organized Crime in Serbia (JTOK) has demanded that the higher courts of Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Niš urgently provide complete case files of the 49 individuals who were pardoned by the country's former president, Aleksandar Vučić. The documents are needed to verify whether these cases contain features of criminal offenses that fall within the prosecutor's jurisdiction, reports the Serbian N1 news outlet.
Vučić signed the pardon decisions on September 27, the day he submitted his resignation as president. The names of all 49 pardoned individuals were published by the Serbian Ministry of Justice on November 3. Among them are former Ministry of Internal Affairs state secretary Dijana Hrkalović, as well as persons involved in cases of violent assaults and other criminal offenses.
As early as October 29, the prosecutor's office requested information and documents related to the pardons from the Ministry of Justice, including the actual decisions and details on how the respective procedures were initiated. However, the ministry did not provide the requested materials. In connection with this, the prosecutor's office sent a second request, setting a deadline of November 9 for a response.
Without waiting for the ministry's reply, JTOK directly approached the courts that received the pardon decisions. The prosecutor's office intends to examine the criminal proceedings' materials and determine whether there are grounds to suspect crimes under its jurisdiction were committed.
Vučić's decision to grant pardons to 49 people has sparked public debate in Serbia. The published list includes individuals involved in official crime cases as well as those accused of attacks on participants in student protest rallies.
Questions have also arisen regarding the procedure of adopting the decisions. The prosecutor's office has requested separate information about whether some pardon requests were submitted on the authorities' own initiative without petitions from convicted persons or suspects.
The review currently relates to the circumstances of the pardons and the content of the criminal cases. The mere fact of requesting materials does not mean the prosecutor's office has already uncovered a crime or declared the former president's decisions unlawful.
