Nezavisne novine: SARAJEVO, BANJALUKA – Organized crime group, suspects for misuses of personal CIPS documents which were used in crime activities, was broken down yesterday in the area of Bijeljina, Banja Luka and Brčko District.
As confirmed to the “Nezavisne”, in the operation of the members of the State Agency for Investigation and Protection of BiH (SIPA) and the police of the RS and the Brčko District, more than 20 officers of the Ministry of Interior of the RS and citizens who made the organized crime group were arrested. Among the arrested are also women and one person was apprehended in Sarajevo as well because that person had a false CIPS ID card.
At the extraordinary press conference in the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH, after the executed operation, they said that the operation ensued after comprehensive investigation which was managed by this Prosecutor’s Office.
“In the coordinated operation of the members of the SIPA, Ministries of Interior of the RS and the Brčko District and the EUPM, at 5.30 hrs on several locations searches were conducted and around 20 people were arrested, mostly members of the Ministry of Interior of the RS and civilian registry of the Brčko District, and their helpers. Evidence were found, among which great sum of money, and illegally acquired ID cards which were used for crime activities. Impounded was also a certain quantity of weapons, and in this moment systems are undergoing analysis”, said Drew Engel, head of the Special Section of the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH for organized crime.
As we found out, members of the SIPA yesterday did not search the CIPS Office in Banja Luka, nor was any of the employees of this office arrested.
Employees of the CIPS we found yesterday in front of the Office did not want to give statements for media. They shortly said that they could not go to their work place until the members of the SIPA allow them that and that they did not know what it was all about.
“Several members of the SIPA came before seven in the morning in front of the CIPS Office. When the employees of the CIPS came to work, they told them they could not enter the building and that they could go home. One of the employees was allowed to enter and post a notice that that office was not working until further notice”, said one of the workers from the building of “Medicinska elektronika”, in which the CIPS Office is situated. He added that the officers of the CIPS were yesterday all day close to this office, so they could offer assistance in case the SIPA members enter the building and start going through the documents.
From the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH, it has been announced that an attention in investigation will be directed to material evidence impounded during the search, suspects’ statements and court expertise, as well as investigation of the CIPS data base.
“Operation is not over and it cannot be excluded that there will be more searches and arrests”, Engel pointed out.
In the CIPS Directorate it has been confirmed that the arrested persons are not their officers, but the employees of the bodies competent for issuing the documents. Contact from the CIPS Directorate yesterday clarified that measures of protection of personal data provide the possibility to establish every operation in the data base, time, place and person who used the data, which should ease the investigation on this case.
“Misuses could have happened in direct contact with clients, which is within competencies of the employees of the Ministries of Interior who work on the CIPS counters”, clarified the contact from the CIPS. He clarified that the law prescribes which institutions and authorized persons have the right to enter the database, and that in the CIPS Directorate they do not have mechanisms to bar them from accessing data.
At the time of completion of this issue of the “Nezavisne”, the spokesperson of the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH, Boris Grubešić, confirmed that several persons arrested in the operation were brought in this Prosecutor’s Office.
Previous sentences for misuse of the CIPS documents
Three years ago the Court of BiH sentenced to eight months imprisonment Cvijo Tovilović, employee of the Ministry of Interior of the RS from Banja Luka, for misuse of position, while the former police officer Milisav Knežević for complicity and forging of documents was sentenced to one year and eight months imprisonment. According to the indictment, Tovilović and Knežević commited the crime acts from August 5, 2003 until July 14, 2004, when they were arrested. Tovilović, who was employed in the Public Security Center in Banja Luka as an officer for the CIPS affairs, processed a greater number of requests for issue of the CIPS documents, although he knew that the persons who submitted them provided the false information. In the indictment it was stated that Knežević was finding the persons to whom he was offering services, and once they reached an agreement on the amount of money the business would be taken over by Tovilović. The prosecutor in this case three years ago said that the investigation in this case was not over.