1 Friday, 10 May 2002

2 [Status Conference]

3 [Open session]

4 [The accused entered court]

5 --- Upon commencing at 12.05 p.m.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Will the Registrar call the case, please.

7 THE REGISTRAR: Good afternoon, Your Honour. This case is

8 IT-95-8/1-PT, the Prosecutor versus Dusan Fustar and Predrag Banovic.

9 JUDGE ROBINSON: And may I have the appearances.

10 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Your Honour, for the Prosecution, we

11 have Mark Vlasic, who is a legal specialist; Camille Bibles, who is a

12 trial attorney; and myself, Jocelyne Bodson. I'm a senior trial

13 attorney.

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: And the Defence.

15 MR. SCUDDER: Good afternoon, Your Honour. My name is Theodore

16 Scudder. I'm here on behalf of the accused Dusan Fustar.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, thank you.

18 MR. BABIC: [Interpretation] Jovan Babic, an attorney from Novi

19 Sad, a member of the bar of Vojvodina, and I'm appearing for Predrag

20 Banovic.

21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you.

22 We have a number of matters to consider and take a decision on in

23 this Status Conference. I should say that the consideration of these

24 matters has been greatly facilitated by the preparatory work that has been

25 done by the senior legal officer and the parties.

1 The first matter that I want to raise is the amendment of the

2 indictment. The motion for amendment was filed in April. There were

3 delays in preparing the B/C/S version; and for that reason, the Defence

4 was given until Thursday, the 9th of May, to respond. We had a response

5 on the 6th of May from the Banovic Defence, but to date, no response from

6 the Fustar Defence. And for that reason, I have to ask Mr. Scudder: What

7 is the explanation for the non-response? Will there be a response?

8 MR. SCUDDER: Your Honour, when I return to Chicago on Monday,

9 we'll make a final decision on that. There may not be a response. I

10 don't know.

11 JUDGE ROBINSON: You are aware that you are out of time. Your

12 response should have been in by yesterday, the 9th of May.

13 MR. SCUDDER: Yes.

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: When there are delays like that, it sets back the

15 entire proceedings.

16 Mr. Scudder. Mr. Scudder, stand.

17 MR. SCUDDER: Yes, Your Honour.

18 JUDGE ROBINSON: I will give you until next week, Tuesday, to file

19 a response in this matter.

20 MR. SCUDDER: That's fine. Thank you.

21 JUDGE ROBINSON: The next matter is the pre-trial brief. The date

22 that has been set for this was the 31st of May.

23 Madam Prosecutor, are we still going to have it on the -- by the

24 31st of May?

25 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour. You will remember

1 that during the Status Conference of 11th of January and during the

2 meeting with the senior legal officer, Ms. Featherstone, it was

3 expressed -- we were asked to focus this trial on the crimes which are

4 mentioned in the indictment and not general facts which are already

5 reviewed and ruled on by the Tribunal in other cases so that we can make

6 effective use of the Tribunal's resources, making sure at the same time

7 that the accused have a fair trial.

8 Therefore, we transmitted to the Defence, on the 16th of April, a

9 list of 81 points that we would like to have their opinion about. And

10 these points have to do with the factual events which constitute the basis

11 of this case, and we're speaking about information that comes from

12 judgements that were rendered previously by the Tribunal in cases the

13 Prosecutor versus Tadic, the Prosecutor versus Kvocka, and the Prosecutor

14 versus Sikirica et al., which is also known as the "Keraterm I" case as

15 opposed to the case that we're reviewing today and which is known as

16 "Keraterm II."

17 We met with the Defence counsel about this on the 8th and 9th of

18 May, and I can tell you that communication between us was very good.

19 Mr. Babic agreed with many of the points which we submitted, and we are

20 waiting for the final response from Mr. Scudder today after this hearing.

21 The Defence position, obviously, is decisive for the preparation

22 of our pre-trial brief which we will file, as you mentioned in January, at

23 the end of May. Obviously, it is very important for preparing that brief

24 for us to know whether we can refer to the third amended indictment and

25 the corrigendum which we filed with the Registry in April, and we would,

1 on that point, like to have your opinion as quickly as possible.

2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you very much for the information that you

3 have provided. It is my hope that you will be able to file your brief by

4 the 31st of May, and obviously, to do that, the final version of the

5 indictment would have to be settled by that time. For that reason, the

6 response from Mr. Scudder is all the more important. But we'll keep the

7 31st of May.

8 In the event that you find that there is a need for an extension,

9 you may apply, although I'm not inviting you. I'm not encouraging you to

10 do so.

11 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Your Honour, if you allow me, I

12 forgot to mention that the list of facts about which there might be an

13 agreement with the Defence will be appended to this pre-trial brief.

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. We have next to look at a date for the

15 filing of the Defence brief, and the date that I will set is Friday,

16 August the 23rd. That is for the filing of the Defence briefs.

17 The next issue I want to deal with is disclosure. First with

18 respect to the requirements of Rule 66(A)(i). My information is that all

19 the witness statements that accompanied the indictment on confirmation

20 have been disclosed in both English and B/C/S without redaction.

21 With regard to the requirements under 66(A)(ii), the Prosecutor

22 has indicated that it will call approximately 25 witnesses in total. And

23 I'm informed that translation and disclosure is progressing well. And it

24 was expected that that would have been completed by the first week of

25 May.

1 Madam Prosecutor, can you comment on that?

2 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour. As regards the

3 requirement to disclose information under 66(A)(i), we have fulfilled our

4 obligation. However, as regards disclosure of documents under 66(A)(ii),

5 we were able to disclose to the Defence counsel the 17th and 18th of April

6 all of the case file of the first trial, which we'll call "Keraterm," as

7 well as more than 50 per cent of the documents in this case on paper copy

8 as well as on CD-Rom in order to facilitate searches.

9 As of the 19th of March, we asked the research department -- or

10 search department to carry out additional searches in order to finish the

11 disclosure obligation. Unfortunately, that section is currently

12 completely taken up for searches for the Milosevic case in Bosnia and

13 Croatia. And the deadline for the disclosure, as you know, is the 1st of

14 June. This means that the searches in our case have taken on a slight

15 delay. To that extent, we respectively [as interpreted] call your

16 attention to a request for an extension of the time in order to fulfill

17 our obligations under 66(A)(ii), and we would like to be able to finish

18 this work by the 15th of June.

19 As regards the list of the witnesses, for the time being, it is

20 almost ready, and we have about 25 witnesses. As regards the list of

21 exhibits, it, too, is almost complete, and there are about 20 exhibits.

22 JUDGE ROBINSON: So you are asking for an extension to the 15th of

23 June?

24 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] If that's possible, that would

25 facilitate our work. If not, we will finish what we have to finish by the

1 end of May as had been stated at the Status Conference of 11 January.

2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Senior legal officer.

3 [Trial Chamber and legal officer confer]

4 JUDGE ROBINSON: We'll extend the time to the 15th of June.

5 The next matter is the list of experts. The OTP had indicated it

6 would be calling four experts: Forensic anthropologist, a forensic

7 medical examiner, a member of the commission of experts - that's

8 Dr. de Grave - and an investigator in relation to burial sites. The

9 expert reports have been obtained and translated and were to be provided

10 to the Defence at the time of the last Rule 65 ter conference.

11 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour.

12 JUDGE ROBINSON: They have been provided?

13 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] As regards the only testimony which

14 will be in written form under 92 bis, we filed on the 20th of April a

15 motion for that statement to be accepted. This is the statement of

16 Dr. de Grave who testified during Keraterm I trial. As regards the rest,

17 all other expert reports were transmitted to the Defence.

18 JUDGE ROBINSON: I see. Thank you very much. I have seen the

19 application for 92 bis. And in due course, we should be ruling on that.

20 Exhibits, I think you've already given the information with regard

21 to the --

22 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour. There are about

23 30 exhibits. The list is not completely ready, but we can certify that it

24 will be ready by the end of May.

25 JUDGE ROBINSON: And as for 92 bis in general, my understanding is

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1 that you take the view, Madam Prosecutor, that most of the witnesses will

2 testify as to the acts and conduct of the accused; and for that reason,

3 Rule 92 bis would not be applicable?

4 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, that's correct, Your Honour. As

5 you asked, we will focus on crimes and the conduct of the accused. And as

6 regards everything with background, factual basis, context, and any

7 possible expert reports on the general background of the war, we are

8 hoping to reach an agreement with the Defence about agreed facts to which

9 I referred to a little while ago.

10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Well, I encourage the parties -- encourage

11 the Defence to work with the Prosecutor on the question of agreed facts.

12 The length of the trial: Madam Prosecutor, you have about

13 20 witnesses. At the rate of one per day, it would seem that the

14 Prosecutor's case should be completed within three to four weeks.

15 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Yes, I think that that is what we can

16 say, Your Honour.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: May I ask whether any of the Defence counsel is

18 in a position to give, at this stage, a general indication as to the scope

19 of the -- of the Defence case?

20 Mr. Scudder?

21 MR. SCUDDER: Judge, I really could not be very specific. My best

22 estimate at this time is that if the Prosecution took three to four weeks,

23 our witnesses wouldn't exceed two weeks. We have names and information

24 from investigators. I have not personally interviewed the people, so the

25 guess is a little bit rough.

1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Babic?

2 MR. BABIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I can also say for the

3 time being, since we have not received all the material which we were

4 supposed to receive from the Prosecution until the 15th of June, I cannot

5 really say precisely how long the presentation of our evidence will last.

6 But as far as I know, I don't think it will exceed two weeks.

7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you very much. I remind all the parties

8 that we're working towards a target of being ready for trial within six

9 months of initial appearance. So that's January (sic).

10 The date of the next Status Conference, in terms of the

11 requirements of the Rules, the next Status Conference will have to be held

12 no later than the 5th of September. I'm going to fix Friday, the 30th of

13 August, as the date for the next Status Conference.

14 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Your Honour, if you permit. I would

15 like to raise an additional point as regards possible protective measures

16 for the victims and witnesses.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

18 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] As you know, we have a list of

19 witnesses which are many of the witnesses in the Keraterm I trial. The

20 Prosecution has filed a request for protection of witnesses, and Judge --

21 President Jorda, rather, granted the protective measures that were asked

22 for on the 17th of April. But at the same time, he decided that new

23 pseudonyms were to be given to the witnesses.

24 We believe that this is a source of confusion, both for the

25 witnesses themselves, the Judges, the Prosecution, and the Defence, and we

1 would therefore ask that the same pseudonyms as those used during the

2 first Keraterm trial, Keraterm trial I, be used in the Keraterm trial II.

3 That is the case we are reviewing today.

4 JUDGE ROBINSON: I can hear your submission. I can see advantages

5 in the method suggested by the President. I think there are arguments on

6 either side. We will have to consider this. We will consider this.

7 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

8 JUDGE ROBINSON: May I ask whether there is any matter that the

9 accused or his counsel wishes to raise about his detention or any other

10 matter relating to the preparation of the trial? Let me ask the accused

11 first.

12 Mr. Banovic, stand. Is there any matter that you wish to bring to

13 the attention of the Court, any matter concerning your detention, your

14 health?

15 THE ACCUSED BANOVIC: [Interpretation] As regards the Detention

16 Unit, everything is all right, but my condition of health isn't really

17 good. So I would like to have more attention paid to my health. Thank

18 you.

19 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Babic, are you in a position to elaborate on

20 that, the matters relating to his health?

21 MR. BABIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, at the last Status

22 Conference, I spoke about the need of providing appropriate medical care

23 to my client in the Detention Unit. In contacting with my client and

24 during my stay in Holland this time, and as regards the doctors are

25 concerned in the Detention Unit, nothing has really changed much. And

1 therefore, I have written a letter to the secretariat, and I would like to

2 call upon the Court to have Mr. Banovic be given adequate medical

3 attention and, therefore, to make our client capable to attend all the

4 trial sessions. I hope that the adequate measures will be taken and that

5 we can resolve the matter.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: What do you mean by "adequate medical

7 attention"? Is there a particular problem?

8 MR. BABIC: [Interpretation] My client suffers from kidney

9 diseases, and according to the information I received from the doctors,

10 specialists, I was told that he needs to be checked up on a more regular

11 basis, and this using ultrasonic measures. So far, none of these

12 check-ups have been done. I have approached the secretariat, and I hope

13 that it will be a measure that will be implemented continually and that we

14 will not have to go back to this question.

15 JUDGE ROBINSON: The health of the accused is very important. I'm

16 going to suggest to you, Mr. Babic, that you file a motion asking the

17 Chamber to require that a medical examination, including an ultrasound, be

18 carried out on the accused for this purpose. You should file that

19 immediately. And in the motion, you will put in all the information and

20 the data that you have that will allow the Chamber to make a decision on

21 this matter.

22 MR. BABIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. I shall do

23 so.

24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Sit, Mr. Banovic.

25 THE ACCUSED BANOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you.

1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Is there any other matter from any of the

2 parties?

3 MS. BODSON: [Interpretation] No, Your Honour. Thank you very

4 much.

5 JUDGE ROBINSON: This hearing stands adjourned.

6 --- Whereupon the Status Conference adjourned

7 at 12.31 p.m.

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