Three judges arrested in Osijek under suspicion of corruption

Early this morning, three Osijek judges, who former Dinamo Football Club boss Zdravko Mamić accused of corruption, were arrested: Darko Krušlin, Zvonko Vekić and Ante Kvesić. Osijek businessman Drago Tadić has also been detained. 

All will be questioned by the Office for Prevention of Corruption and Organized Crime in Zagreb.

Unofficially, the judges were arrested as part of the expanded investigation against the Mamić brothers, who are suspected of bribery and trading in influence.

“It was difficult to expect that the State Attorney's Office will not conduct a thorough investigation and check all allegations made by Mr. Mamić at the expense of the judges. On the other hand he is also included in this procedure, so it is very likely that the State Attorney's Office could not resist the situation in which they will process him, try to get him to Croatia and then resolve all of this here in a package, all of his accusations, all suspicions that have arisen and everything he spoke about in the media in the last months,” said Darko Krušlin's lawyer, Ljubo Pavasović Visković.

President Zoran Milanovic and Justice Minister Ivan Malenica commented on the arrests.

“Three judges, that is a system disorder, it's like Lupus, a difficult immunological situation. It's a lot. That's the Croatian Democratic Union's judiciary, one to one, there's no discussion about it, Plenković protects this and his brother is Šeks. You asked me to comment the arrests in Osijek. I can't do that in detail, but you know if they arrested three judges, that's a network,” said President Zoran Milanović.

“The arrest of these judges surely casts a bad shadow over the Croatian judiciary; however this demonstrates that no one is untouchable and that everyone must be held accountable for misdoings they commit,” said Justice Minister Ivan Malenica.

Fugitive Zdravko Mamić commented on the entire situation on Facebook.

"After I sent the famous USB stick with evidence to state prosecutors eight months ago, and three months after all of us, you who read and myself, started fighting for judicial reform, this morning the corrupt judges I called out were arrested and criminal proceedings have been initiated against them, just like I announced," said Mamić on his Facebook profile.

It should be recalled that Zdravko Mamić called out the judges for taking bribes in order to acquit him at his trial for illegally syphoning money from the Dinamo football club.

Source: HRT