(12 Dec 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Belgrade, Serbia – 12 December 2024
1. Various of police vans arriving at court
2. Relatives of the victims of the mass shooting on May 4 2023 arriving at court
3. Various of relatives of the victims outside of court
4. People queuing outside of court
5. Families and relatives of the victims walking up stairs inside court building
6. Police inside court
7. Serbian flag outside court
8. People coming out of court
9. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Stefan Stefanovic, lawyer representing families of the victims:
”We are pleased that the maximum prison sentence, provided for by law, for Uros Blazic and Radisa Blazic, 20 years each, was imposed. But we are certainly not satisfied with the length of the sentence for Uros Blazic, which is, of course, inadequate. Namely, the families of the victims have not received full justice and the entire truth has not been revealed.”
10. Nebojsa Perovic, another lawyer representing families of the victims, coming out of the court
11. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Nebojsa Perovic, lawyer representing families of victims:
”We live in a time when legal solutions cause pain, and that is a sentence of 20 years for nine people killed and 13 seriously injured, and I think that this sentence must be a message to everyone in our community and our country that there must be an urgent change in criminal legislation and that we no longer have privileged murderers. The current legal solutions protect and nurture those who commit such a terrible crime.”
12. Sasa Panic, father of two victims of mass shooting, talking to media
13. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) Sasa Panic, father of two victims of mass shooting:
”I maintain that there is no adequate punishment for them and that 20 years is not enough for both of them.”
14. Police vans leaving the court
STORYLINE:
A Serbian court Thursday convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison a young man who gunned down nine people and wounded 13, in one of two back-to-back mass killings last year which shook the Balkan nation.
Uros Blazic, 21, took up an automatic rifle on May 4, 2023 and opened fire at multiple locations in two villages outside Belgrade, randomly shooting at young people hanging out on a spring evening.
Blazic was “aware of his actions and their illegality, and with relentless violent behaviour" killed and wounded people, judges said.
The carnage came just a day after a teenager using his father’s gun shot and killed nine fellow students and a guard at an elementary school in central Belgrade in what was Serbia’s first ever school shooting.
The parents of the school shooting suspect have gone on trial in Belgrade.
The suspect himself was below the age of criminal responsibility and remains in a specialised mental institution.
The killings stunned the country which was used to wars and crisis but where mass shootings were relatively rare.
The tragedies later triggered a wave of street protests and a crackdown on widespread illegal gun ownership.
Blazic was arrested in central Serbia hours after the shootings in the villages of Dubona and Malo Orasje, just south of Belgrade.
The 20-year prison sentence is the maximum permitted under Serbian law for people under 21 years of age. Blazic was 20 when he committed the crime.
Separately, the gunman’s father, Radisa Blazic was also convicted for illegal possession of guns used in the shooting, and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
During his trial, the younger Blazic said he could not explain what prompted him to kill so many people.
AP video by Ivana Bzganovic
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