ZAGREB, October 20, 2018 – Chief State Prosecutor Dražen Jelenić has confirmed to the media that his office has completed the reconstruction of a missing file on a 2011 case concerning information leaks from a police investigation into elite prostitution in the context of which Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) vice-president and deputy parliament speaker Milijan Brkić has been mentioned.
“We now have a picture of what exactly that file was about and the facts it contained. Based on the information obtained, we have asked the Zagreb County Court and the police to give us all those documents that according to our information should have been in the file, and now the case needs to be analysed and a decision made,” Jelenić said in an interview with Croatian Radio to be aired on Saturday, the HRT public broadcaster said on its website.
In a statement to the N1 TV broadcaster, Jelenić commented on the acquittal of Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić and his co-defendants in a case in which they were charged with favourable treatment of a non-governmental organisation at the expense of the municipal budget.
The indictment alleged that Bandić, his assistant Ivica Lovrić and the CEO of the Zagreb Markets company Zdenka Palac allowed the non-governmental organisation “In the Name of the Family” to use market stalls for gathering signatures for a referendum to change electoral law free of charge, which cost the municipal budget at least 308,000 kuna (41,500 euro).
Jelenić said that the acquittal was not a slap in the face of either his office or the USKOK anti-corruption agency. “USKOK did its jobs in line with the law, basing its conclusion about the existence of founded suspicion in the case on lawful evidence and I expect that it will now use legal means at its disposal,” Jelenić said.
