Mayor of Obrenovac Milorad Grcic was arrested by order of the Higher Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade on suspicion that while he was acting director of JP EPS, he and his associates damaged that public company. Businessman Aleksandar Papić was also arrested in connection with the withdrawal of money from JP EPS, as well as 13 other persons. The damage is estimated at more than one million euros, and everyone has been detained for up to 48 hours.
"The Criminal Police Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Serbia, under the order of the special anti-corruption department of the High Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade, arrested a total of 15 suspects, among whom is the current president of the Obrenovac municipality and the former acting director of the Electric Power Company of Serbia," said Nenad Stefanović, chief prosecutor of the High Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade.
An investigation will be conducted against these persons due to the existence of grounds for suspicion that they abused their official position and powers in connection with public procurement for the public company EPS and damaged it for more than one million euros and obtained illegal property benefits, he added.
In addition to Grčić, by the order of the prosecution, the coordinator in the Sector of ICT affairs in JP EPS IM, the employee in this sector NS, the director of the company "Tim Systems" doo Belgrade TA, the de facto owner of "Tim Systems" AP and the responsible person in that company NV, the director of PD "IntellSec" doo Belgrade MB, the director of PD "HRC Horeca" doo MM, as well as KM, PG, MR, IR
The head of the Department for Technical Protection Systems and Information Security in the Sector for Automatic Data Processing Branch of RB Kolubara LJ.S, the director of the Football Club "Borac" from Lazarevac DB and KB were also deprived of their freedom.
The suspects are charged with the criminal offenses of abuse of official position, abuse of the position of a responsible person, money laundering, accepting bribes, giving bribes and trading in influence.
Šabić: There were criminal charges against them before, but they were rejected
Lawyer Rodoljub Šabić assessed for N1 that it was a "transparent show for the people" and reminded that bombastic arrests of some powerful people were announced in public, but it turned out not to be so.
"What we are hearing now is a different league... These are people against whom there were criminal charges before, but they were rejected in turn," Sabic said.
He adds that these arrests take place at a time when they are needed for the daily political needs of the ruling party.
"The president announced it and it had to happen," he stated.
"Someone made an effort to confirm what the president announced." To me, this is more than unconvincing", emphasized Sabić.
Transparency Serbia: Doubts about the independence of the Prosecutor's Office
The organization Transparency Serbia (TS) announced that the arrest of Grcic actually "casts a serious shadow on the independence of the Higher Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade."
"The fact that the news appeared a few weeks after the president of the state announced the fight against corruption, and the day before the arrest practically announced today's action, indicates at the very least that the prosecutor's office provides information about planned investigations to state bodies outside its hierarchy, and in the worst case that the political top decides on arrests and the initiation of investigative actions," the TS statement states.
They believe that such action is the biggest concession that officials could make to corruption suspects, "because, after such announcements, they can rightly claim that politically motivated proceedings are being conducted against them, even when they are clearly guilty."
The TS points out that it is unclear whether there are any new findings of the VJT in Belgrade about Grcic's abuses that were not known to the prosecution during all these years.
Paunović: It is unusual that an action is now being carried out for a criminal offense committed in 2019.
The prosecutor Jasmina Paunović, who was previously dismissed precisely because of her investigation into abuses in the EPS, and later persecuted and punished, points out in an interview with Nova.rs that the real question is why the arrest of Milorad Grčić was delayed until today.
"I don't know the exact details of the case, but it is unusual that a major action is being carried out now for a criminal offense that was committed in 2019, and knowledge about it existed several years ago. Milorad Grčić was not involved in the case that my colleague and I worked on, but the question is where it would all come to, and the modus operandi through which money is extracted from public companies, including EPS, is the same, which is much more expensive charging for services and payment for fictitious jobs, some of which were never even completed," explains Jasmina Paunović for Nova.
