
Defendants 1 and 2 – R.J. and R.S. – were a married couple who resided in Milan at the time the crime was committed, and were unreachable at the time the trial was conducted. They had both been previously convicted of several offences other than human trafficking. The third defendant, J.J., was R.J.’s cousin, and he was was charged with acting together with R.J., R.S., and others, recruiting the victim through deception, threatening the victim with the use of force, and hiding his identity documents.
J.J. was accused of having recruited the victim, he allegedly talked with the victim on the telephone on October 10, 2011 and then met him in person. The victim claimed that the defendant had recruited him through deception, by offering to find him a grapes-picking job in Switzerland. The defendant allegedly deceived the victim with a sham job offer of a well-paid job, offering a monthly salary of 1.500 € and including free accommodation, conditions which lead the victim to accept the offer. According to the victim, the defendant then accompanied him to take a bus to Italy, where he would supposedly meet the whole group of grape-pickers. Instead the victim was met by R.J. when he reached Milan..
R.J. picked up the victim in Milan and took him to a rented apartment first, and then to a Roma community camp in the suburbs, where R.J. and R.S., together with a few unknown persons, repeatedly tried to persuade the victim to commit acts of larceny for their profit. The victim refused to engage in this criminal activity, and as a consequence, he was beaten by those unknown persons, after which R.S. gave the order to lock him up in a shack, where he spent ten days. In the meantime, R.S., R.J., and others threatened to kill him unless he accepted their proposal to commit criminal acts in their benefit. In addition, R.J. threatened him with a gun. Moreover, R.J and R.S. had previously taken away I.D.’s personal documents.
Under the aforementioned circumstances, the victim, I.D., was forced to submit and engage in criminal acts, and therefore he committed thievery in Milan a few times with R.J., R.S. and other members of their group. On December 2, 2011, the victim was arrested by the Italian police together with a couple of other members of the group. They were released shortly after, and two days later, on December 4, I.D. managed to escape and to seek assistance at the police station in Milan with the help of his girlfriend from Serbia, who he contacted through the internet, as he did not speak neither Italian nor English. The police then sent him to the Serbian Consulate in Milan, where he was provided with new travel documents. The victim was then able to leave Italy, and returned to Serbia. The victim was able to testify and to attend the trial.
Serbia
ItalyThe victim sought help at a local police station in Milan, where they took his statement, gave him medical assistance and sent him to the Consulate of the Republic of Serbia in order to get new documents and be able to leave Italy. All the statements taken and the relevant reports were then sent to the Court in Serbia and used at the trial.
1st Instance:
Court: High Court of Kragujevac (Viši Sud u Kragujevcu)
Location: Kragujevac, Serbia
Date of decision: 3 December 2012
Reference: 3K-97/12
In reaching its decision, the Court considered the available evidence including: a report compiled by the Center for the Protection of Human Trafficking Victims, the translation of the statement made by the victim before the Italian police, translated medical and other documents issued while the victim was in Italy, the testimony of a witness regarding excerpts of phone calls between J.J., the victim and others.
The Court held that the evidence sufficiently proved that R.J. and R.S. had forced the victim to engage in criminal acts for their own profit, and therefore found both defendants guilty of human trafficking under articles 1, 2, 4, 22, 42, 43, 45 and 54 of the Criminal Code. The Court sentenced R.J. and R.S. to eight years of imprisonment, and ordered them to pay for the costs of the proceedings.
The victim’s girlfriend’s statements with regard to the defendant were particularly important, for they were contradictory and the Court did ruled that they were only partly admissible. Moreover, another important testimony was provided by a witness whose claims matched with J.J.’s allegations. All these together lead the Court to rule in J.J.'s benefit.
Article 388 (1) of the Criminal Code: “Whoever by force or threat, deception or maintaining deception, abuse of authority, trust, dependency relationship, difficult circumstances of another, retaining identity papers or by giving or accepting money or other benefit, recruits, transports, transfers, sells, buys, acts as intermediary in sale, hides or holds another person with intent to exploit such person’s labour, forced labour, commission of offences, prostitution, mendacity, pornography, removal of organs or body parts or service in armed conflicts, shall be punished by imprisonment of two to twelve years.”
Amount to be determined when the defendant becomes available to Serbian authorities
Article 388 (1) of the Criminal Code: “Whoever by force or threat, deception or maintaining deception, abuse of authority, trust, dependency relationship, difficult circumstances of another, retaining identity papers or by giving or accepting money or other benefit, recruits, transports, transfers, sells, buys, acts as intermediary in sale, hides or holds another person with intent to exploit such person’s labour, forced labour, commission of offences, prostitution, begging, pornography, removal of organs or body parts or service in armed conflicts, shall be punished by imprisonment of two to twelve years.”
Amount to be determined when the defendant becomes available to Serbian authorities.
Article 388 (1) of the Criminal Code: “Whoever by force or threat, deception or maintaining deception, abuse of authority, trust, dependency relationship, difficult circumstances of another, retaining identity papers or by giving or accepting money or other benefit, recruits, transports, transfers, sells, buys, acts as intermediary in sale, hides or holds another person with intent to exploit such person’s labour, forced labour, commission of offences, prostitution, begging, pornography, removal of organs or body parts or service in armed conflicts, shall be punished by imprisonment of two to twelve years.”
The Court held that there was no conclusive evidence, and therefore found J.J. not guilty of participating in the criminal act of human trafficking, or recruiting, threatening with the use of force or hiding anyone’s documents. This defendant was therefore released.
High Court of Kragujevac [Viši Sud u Kragujevcu]
Whereas one of the defendants, J.J. participated at trial, the authorities did not have access to the other two – R.J. and R.S.