1 Monday, 19 February 2007

2 [Open session]

3 [The accused entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 9.01 a.m.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Good morning, everyone.

6 Before we proceed with this morning's evidence, we would like to

7 briefly go into private session to deal with one matter.

8 [Private session]

9 (redacted)

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21 [Open session]

22 THE REGISTRAR: We are in open session, Your Honours.

23 [Trial Chamber confers]

24 JUDGE BONOMY: The witness proposed this morning, Dr. Baccard, has

25 led to the submission by counsel for Mr. Lukic of a motion to exclude the

1 testimony of the witness and the documentary evidence that goes beyond the

2 scope of the indictment, and four particular areas are identified in the

3 motion. The Prosecution were given an opportunity, if they wished, to

4 file a written response to this before we started this morning and, I

5 understand, decided to file no response.

6 That doesn't necessarily complete the matter, Mr. Stamp. Is there

7 anything you want to say about the motion to the effect that four of the

8 areas addressed on the face of it by Dr. Baccard are not relevant to the

9 indictment?

10 MR. STAMP: The Prosecution does not object to the motion.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, it's quite easy to identify the documents.

12 It's a bit more difficult to deal with the testimony. And what I propose

13 we do is in the next day or so identify the passages.

14 Now, that could probably be done by agreement, and you could

15 identify the passages and clarify for us for sure the documents, although

16 I think they're easier for us to identify.

17 Mr. Ivetic.

18 MR. IVETIC: I think that can be done, Your Honour.

19 Unfortunately, I also have another matter to raise, because in looking

20 through the underlying material I discovered that one exhibit, in

21 particular P206, also had an additional four sites that were the subject

22 of some forensic examination for which there is evidence, allegations, et

23 cetera, in the underlying material relating to Brusnik, Nevoljane,

24 Skenderaj Srbica, and Mitrovica Sovido. These were not in my motion but

25 these are also sites that are not ones for which we have had any pleadings

1 in the indictment or any witnesses led about the underlying events.

2 So in all fairness, I think I would have to let the Prosecution

3 know that I consider these to also be ones that need to be excluded. And,

4 again, I've so far been able to figure out which document it's related to

5 and I think Mr. Stamp and I could come to a consensus as to what parts of

6 the testimony might relate to that. We might be able to avoid even

7 leading such evidence, either in cross or in direct, if that's the ruling

8 of the Court. So that can be done, I think, and then -- well, I think

9 I'll stop there and we'll finish this area because I have two other areas

10 that are on a related but different theme.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: I assume that the written motion was the extent of

12 your objection.

13 MR. IVETIC: It was until I had some more time to consult with my

14 colleagues and to look through some of the other underlying materials, and

15 there's a couple more technical objections. I could go into them very

16 briefly now if that's ...

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Let's deal with the one you've just mentioned.

18 It sounds, Mr. Stamp, as though you're only now being alerted to

19 this additional contention that part of P206 relates to four additional

20 areas which don't feature in the indictment.

21 MR. STAMP: Indeed, Your Honour.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Are you able to deal with that straight off?

23 MR. STAMP: Yes, Your Honour. We won't be relying on that part of

24 the exhibits. Some of the forensic teams examined many sites and they've

25 prepared single reports for all the sites, and sometimes it included one

1 or two other sites which are relevant. But we're not relying on the other

2 sites.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

4 Now, Mr. Ivetic, the other point you wish to raise.

5 MR. IVETIC: The first point relates to exhibits -- parts of

6 exhibits P206, P207, and P208, and I could identify them rather

7 specifically if need be. Essentially, they relate to the beginning of

8 each section on the various sites that are alleged in the indictment. It

9 has a section entitled "The Facts" which essentially, from a reading of

10 it, recite a version of the events as told or asserted by the

11 investigators of the OTP, the Office of the Prosecutor, to the various

12 forensic teams that worked there. And in the view of myself and at least

13 one colleague who talked about this in considerable detail with me, we

14 believe that this is an improper use of, in this instance, Rule 94 bis, to

15 bring in the assertions of the OTP investigators and have them in the form

16 of a written evidence as to what happened at the underlying sites where

17 the forensic examinations or investigations were undertaken. We think

18 it's an impermissible inference on the part of the written evidence to

19 bring this in in this manner, especially since we don't know exactly what

20 the bases or background is for the assertions that the investigators of

21 the OTP make for the allegations. I mean, we can assume it's, in part,

22 the witnesses we've heard, but it might also be the witnesses we have not

23 heard for whatever reason.

24 So we think that the section in each of the forensic

25 investigations that gives a background of the facts ought not to come into

1 the record or either be by redaction or by a ruling from the Court, that

2 it will not considered or relied upon. I think that will also be

3 sufficient, but I think we do need, for the record, to clarify that

4 because it is in there and it is essentially something that OTP

5 investigators are telling persons and for which the forensic

6 investigators, apparently from the written material, have not undertaken

7 any steps to verify, double-check, et cetera.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Can you give us an example, please?

9 MR. IVETIC: Sure, if I can just open up my packet. For instance,

10 in P206, beginning with the Izbica site, I believe it starts at page 5.

11 The first paragraph says:

12 "According to information provided by the ICTY investigators on 27

13 March 1999, the forces of the Republic of Serbia and the Federal Republic

14 of Yugoslavia attacked the village of Izbica and rounded up approximately

15 150 people who were then shot dead at three execution sites in the area

16 around the village. Over the course of the next few days the victims were

17 identified and buried in a field by villagers who survived. After the

18 world press found out about the massacre, Serbian forces exhumed the

19 bodies and transferred them to an unknown destination."

20 That's the first site listed in P206 and it's submitted that this

21 portion of the report is clearly just related to matters asserted by the

22 ICTY investigators. In fact, when one reads the report, obviously there's

23 parts of it that do not confirm the number of persons, et cetera, and it's

24 obvious that this portion of the report is not based upon any forensic or

25 scientific investigation that was undertaken and is merely a re-telling of

1 what the Prosecution has alleged. So we just want to make it clear.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

3 Mr. Stamp, what's raised now is statements which are an

4 introductory narrative to pathological findings which are specifically

5 said to be matters asserted by ICTY investigators. What's your response

6 to the suggestion that while these can be read as background introducing

7 the rest of the material within each exhibit, these statements by ICTY

8 investigators should not be considered to be evidence in the case?

9 MR. STAMP: I entirely agree with that. It's the standard thing

10 that forensic scientists, pathologists, will get a history of in respect

11 of a body or the circumstances. It's just context in which the report was

12 made and the examinations were done.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: I think you can take it, Mr. Ivetic, that the Trial

14 Chamber is capable of distinguishing these statements from, for example,

15 the hearsay investigation by the pathologist that might have led to the

16 identification of the body through, for example, looking at associated

17 documents, that sort of thing. Where it's clearly a statement of

18 background history made by an investigator to identify the subject of the

19 inquiry, then we will treat it as such and not as evidence per se in the

20 case.

21 For the avoidance of doubt, we shall order the Prosecution and the

22 Lukic team, by close of business on Wednesday, so by the end of Wednesday,

23 to submit an agreed statement of the passages in the -- this must be the

24 transcript, I think, of Mr. Baccard -- Dr. Baccard from the previous case

25 and the parts of the documentation that should not be considered by the

1 Trial Chamber.

2 Now, does that resolve the preliminary matters?

3 MR. IVETIC: I have just one brief again which is with respect to

4 P210 which falls in a different category.

5 P210 is labelled as an expert ballistics report which talks about

6 a wide variety of weapons and, in addition to giving technical information

7 about the weapons, has peppered throughout it certain inferences, such

8 as "this weapon is no longer -- is rarely used by regular units;

9 nevertheless, the large number of them in circulation means it is possible

10 to equip irregular units, such as paramilitaries, in a very short time.

11 It was more than likely used in the theatre of operations."

12 First of all, the witness that will be before us, Dr. Baccard, has

13 a specific area of specialty, specific area of expert testimony that has

14 been proposed. This expert ballistics report, I believe, goes beyond that

15 where they're talking about weapons that, at least from my reading of the

16 report, there is no indication of any forensic evidence that they were

17 actually used and yet we have a report that talks about the various

18 weapons and talks about assumptions that they were used, that they were

19 used by paramilitaries or by other forces, and clearly is not referenced

20 by Dr. Baccard and does not appear to be part of his conclusions or

21 findings. But it's a fairly bulky exhibit that we have being proposed by

22 the Office of the Prosecutor, and again it's not authored by Dr. Baccard,

23 it's authored by Franck Pages. I believe the original is in French, is

24 part of the French forensic mission. And it's -- respectfully, it's the

25 opinion of myself and some of the other teams that this exhibit ought not

1 to come into evidence in this form through Dr. Baccard, who I don't think

2 can speak to some of the matters that are asserted and give information as

3 to what bases there are for the impermissible assumptions and assertions

4 that are made therein.

5 And, again, I don't know whether this is something that the

6 Prosecution intends to rely on, but it is listed in the 65 ter

7 notification of exhibits that they intended to lead with this witness, and

8 so that's why I raise it. And that would be my final preliminary point on

9 this witness. Thank you.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Ivetic.

11 Mr. Stamp, your position on that document.

12 MR. STAMP: The Prosecution does intend to rely upon that

13 exhibit. Some of the conclusions of Dr. Baccard, including his

14 affirmation of the conclusions of the French experts, to some degree,

15 relies or rely upon matters contained in that particular exhibit. It is

16 not uncommon; indeed, it is to be submitted that it is proper for a

17 forensic scientist to obtain from various subspecialties, for example,

18 ballistics, areas of analysis that might assist in the consideration of

19 the evidence before them, which is exactly what happened here.

20 One of Dr. Baccard's areas of specialty, if you look at his

21 curriculum vitae, is an area of what is called wound ballistics. That is

22 an area of science where you can examine a wound and relate it to the type

23 of weapons. And in those circumstances, it would be appropriate for a

24 ballistic -- for a pathologist to review a ballistic report to see if they

25 are assisted in making the findings or if they, in any way, compromise

1 whatever scientific findings can be made.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: This sounds like it's a matter we'll have to deal

3 with when it arises. It may be that Dr. Baccard refers to it to identify

4 conclusions which he is making, but of course the report itself will have

5 to be established in some way. And when we come to address these issues,

6 we'll see whether it's satisfactorily compiled for the purpose for which

7 you intend to use it or not. So let's wait until that arises. No doubt

8 our attention will be drawn to it by Mr. Ivetic when it does. We'll

9 probably reserve the question at that stage until we get to the end of the

10 cross-examination and make a determination on how much it has assisted our

11 consideration of Dr. Baccard's evidence at that stage.

12 Now, that appears to clear the deck, so let's have the witness,

13 please.

14 [The witness entered court]

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Good morning, Dr. Baccard.

16 THE WITNESS: Good morning.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Which language do you wish to use in the course of

18 your testimony?

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I ask to be able to speak my mother

20 tongue, i.e., French.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Could you speak the solemn declaration to speak the

22 truth by reading aloud the document which will now be placed before you.

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will tell

24 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you. Please be seated.

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Stamp.

3 MR. STAMP: Thank you, Your Honour.

4 WITNESS: ERIC BACCARD

5 [Witness answered through interpreter]

6 Examination by Mr. Stamp:

7 Q. Good morning, Doctor. Could you start by stating your name and

8 your present occupation.

9 A. My name is Eric Baccard. I am currently the coordinator of

10 forensic and criminologist activities at the office of the prosecutor of

11 the ICC.

12 Q. And by profession you are what? Could you say?

13 A. I'm a forensic pathologist.

14 Q. Now, on the 31st of January, 2002, where were you employed and in

15 what capacity?

16 A. On the 31st of January, 2002, well, I can't tell you with any

17 certainty, but I believe that I was at the time employed as a chief

18 forensic pathologist of the OTP of the ICTY.

19 Q. And in that capacity, did you prepare a report?

20 A. Yes, that's correct. I prepared a report, but it took me several

21 months to prepare that report. It took me from six to seven months. I

22 started in 2001 and I finished when I filed the report in 2002.

23 Q. The 31st of January, 2002?

24 A. Yes, that's correct.

25 Q. And what was the material that the report covered? What is the

1 topic of the report?

2 A. This report dealt with forensic examinations, examinations of

3 bodies, of autopsies, crime scene investigations also conducted by several

4 forensic teams that worked in Kosovo in the year 1999.

5 MR. STAMP: Your Honours, the report is Exhibit 1809, P1809.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: This will be admitted, Mr. Stamp, subject to the

7 exclusion of the parts that you and Mr. Ivetic will agree upon between now

8 and Wednesday relating to areas which are not the subject of this case.

9 MR. STAMP: Very well, Your Honour.

10 Could we go immediately to page 81 -- 82 -- 81 of the report.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: I imagine that just for the sake of clarification,

12 I imagine that means we are marking that for identification, on the basis

13 we'll make the final decision on admission when we see your agreed

14 confirmation of what's to be excluded from our consideration.

15 MR. STAMP: Yes, Your Honour.

16 Q. Pages 80 to 81 consist of your curriculum vitae.

17 A. Yes, that's correct.

18 Q. And I see here, apart from various work and scholarship in

19 forensic pathology, toxicology, medical law, criminalistics, forensic

20 psychiatry, you also have at least two degrees in wound ballistics.

21 A. I hold only one degree in wound ballistics. These are studies I

22 did at the Faculty of Medicine in Marseilles. I also hold a diploma in

23 criminology after studying at the Faculty of Paris.

24 Q. I beg your pardon. Yes, one degree in wound ballistics. But

25 you're also an expert of the court of appeal in Grenoble in wound

1 ballistics, forensic pathology and forensic anthropology; correct?

2 A. I'm an expert with the court of appeal, but I'm, most importantly,

3 a national expert with the cour de cassation, the supreme court we have in

4 France. With regard to forensic anthropology, I have training but I don't

5 have a degree in that specific area of forensic anthropology.

6 Q. And you're also president of the French Wound Ballistics Society.

7 A. I was the president of that society, because this report is quite

8 old now.

9 Q. Did you testify in respect to the matters stated in your report in

10 the trial of Slobodan Milosevic on the 21st of May, 2002? And in that

11 testimony, did you clarify certain aspects of your report?

12 A. Yes, that's correct. I testified during two days in May 2002. I

13 also testified at another date. I do not remember whether that was in

14 June or July 2002, and I testified on that particular date about another

15 site.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Stamp, if you just give me a moment.

17 Dr. Baccard, we've been given the report you did in relation to

18 the 1999 investigations, and you've just been referred to the curriculum

19 vitae that's in that report. Your life has moved on since then. We

20 already know that you're now chief of the same subject matter but at the

21 ICC. I think we would like to have your CV updated. We'll have a break

22 for about half an hour later on this morning, and rather than try to get

23 you to remember anything significant that's occurred since you gave

24 evidence in the Milosevic trial, it might be helpful if you just took five

25 minutes during that break to think it through and give us a completed

1 update on your CV when you return after the break.

2 MR. STAMP: Your Honour, I think --

3 JUDGE BONOMY: Oh, you have it.

4 MR. STAMP: -- a copy exists, but I had thought that there was no

5 difference between this updated CV, curriculum vitae, except that he was

6 now at the ICC. However, there might be a difference. But we do have a

7 copy ...

8 [Prosecution counsel confer]

9 MR. STAMP: ... which was done this year. So perhaps you could

10 upload that --

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Can I see the copy you have just now, please.

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's correct, Your Honour. The

13 only difference since the previous resume was drafted is the fact that I

14 now work for the ICC since October 2004.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: In 2002, when you completed the report and then

16 gave evidence, were you a full-time employee of the OTP here or were --

17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I have never been employed full

18 time, Your Honour. I worked on a contract basis. On several occasions,

19 and after 2002, I continued working as a forensic consultant for the OTP;

20 this was still on a contract basis and I was monitoring the post mortem

21 examinations in Macedonia and Croatia.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Earlier this morning when you were asked your

23 current post, you said that you were the chief pathologist -- sorry, you

24 were the coordinator of forensic and criminologist activities at the OTP

25 of the ICC. Is your role there similar to the one you had here? Is it a

1 consultancy position or are you there fully engaged on the work of the

2 ICC?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, Your Honour, I currently work

4 full time since October of 2004 for the OTP at the ICC. And what I do

5 goes beyond forensic and criminal activities because I'm also in charge of

6 monitoring the work of the geographical systems and satellite imaging

7 systems.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Between 31st January 2002 and October 2004, is

9 there any other significant development in your career that we should be

10 aware of?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Except for the fact that I have

12 worked for the OTP at the ICTY on several occasions, I also worked as an

13 expert in France and I worked for various domestic jurisdictions in

14 France, whether these be civilian or criminal.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: And I see here that you were a scientific

16 consultant of the European Institute of Forensic Medicine during that

17 period I've just referred to.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's correct.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Stamp, I think this should be uploaded into the

20 system. Thank you.

21 MR. STAMP: Very well, Your Honour.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: And you should then alert us to the number that it

23 has and we will admit it, because it does advance our knowledge of

24 Dr. Baccard's experience. Please continue.

25 MR. STAMP:

1 Q. You indicated that you did testify on the 20 -- you testified in

2 the Milosevic case twice - may I just remind you of the dates - the first

3 time being the 21st of May, 2002, and the next time on the 15th of July,

4 2002.

5 A. As far as my first testimony is concerned, if I remember

6 correctly, the testimony lasted two days, the 21st and 22nd of May, 2002.

7 Q. And on the first occasion you testified in respect to the matters

8 in your report of January 2002; is that correct?

9 A. That's correct, Prosecutor.

10 Q. Thank you. Did you prepare another report?

11 A. That's also correct, Prosecutor. The OTP - I believe it was

12 Mr. Dirk Ryneveld - has asked me on the 22nd of January, 2002 -- gave me

13 documents which contained a report conducted by French forensic

14 scientists, and this was the first time that I got to know about this

15 report on a site which I did not know anything about. This was an added

16 as an addendum to my report afterwards.

17 This report pertains to -- this was a post mortem report conducted

18 by Professors Lecomte and Vorhauer as well as a crime scene investigation

19 report. This concerned the Cirez site which had been investigated on the

20 2nd and 3rd of July, 1999, by the French forensic team of experts.

21 Q. And your report is dated the 23rd of May, 2002; is that correct?

22 A. This was on the 23rd of May. According to the copy I have, this

23 was on the 23rd of May, 2002.

24 MR. STAMP: Your Honours, the addendum report is entered as P384.

25 I think it's already in evidence.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. And the transcript?

2 MR. STAMP: The transcript for the 21st and the 22nd of May is

3 P2747. I think they've all been uploaded into e-court in one sequential

4 bundle, so for the 21st and the 22nd of May and the 15th of July, it's

5 2747, P2747.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

7 MR. STAMP: And I imagine the order in respect to the section not

8 related to his evidence here applies --

9 JUDGE BONOMY: The transcript will be marked for identification on

10 the same basis as the original report. The supplementary report, though,

11 can be admitted.

12 MR. STAMP: Yes, Your Honour.

13 Q. If we could go first to your initial report. We see from the

14 report that it analyses various other reports by forensic scientists who

15 did investigation in Kosovo in 1999. Firstly, just for clarity, did you

16 participate in those investigations in the field in Kosovo in 1999?

17 A. My answer is no. In 1999 I worked for the ICTY. I was in Bosnia

18 and Croatia.

19 Q. We can see from your report that these field investigations were

20 done by a variety of international teams. Were the methodologies applied

21 by these teams consistent or were they different in some cases?

22 A. The purpose of the assignment I had been given by Mr. Dirk

23 Ryneveld was as follows: We had to analyse the protocols, procedures, and

24 methodologies observed by the various teams on the ground, and admittedly

25 some of these teams sometimes came up with different findings. The

1 overall conclusion was to state that these discrepancies in no way

2 affected the conclusions that had been drawn on the basis of these

3 reports.

4 Q. And in the -- before I proceed to that, did you also review or

5 check the professional qualifications of the scientific experts who did

6 these reports in the field in Kosovo?

7 A. Yes, Prosecutor. Automatically we always checked the

8 qualifications for our colleagues. And if you would like me to expand on

9 this, I can say that these forensic teams were, generally speaking, made

10 up of forensic pathologists who, generally speaking, headed a forensic

11 institute in their home country. These people were well known in their

12 country and internationally also these people had written a number of

13 articles, and their professional qualifications met the requirements we

14 expected for that kind of assignment.

15 Q. Which takes me to the next question. In respect to all of the

16 material that you used for your report, did the standard of forensic

17 science apply much, the standard which is appropriate in international

18 forensic science?

19 A. Yes, quite right. These criteria were the same as the criteria

20 which were used internationally. As I mentioned -- as I have mentioned

21 already, there were a number of differences that were due, for instance,

22 to the fact that some people used X-rays and other people didn't, and in

23 certain cases the British team, for instance, the British team did not

24 look into internal organs when conducting their forensic examination but

25 conducted an external examination and used X-rays.

1 Q. Did you find in respect to any of the reports for the various

2 sites that the discrepancies or errors that you observed would have

3 affected the overall findings in those reports?

4 A. I think these reports need to be put into perspective. These were

5 conducted in 1999, and at the time this was done with what was available.

6 These were emergency situations. This had to be prepared hurriedly. We

7 did not have well-equipped autopsy rooms. Sometimes post mortem

8 examinations had to be conducted against a -- with just a door that had

9 been put on pieces of wood. Sometimes we had no water at all. This is

10 just to say that, given the number of victims that we examined, some

11 errors were discovered in the reports afterwards.

12 On reading the report again, I did discover some errors when I

13 compared photo albums, for instance, and some of the descriptions

14 contained in the reports. A list of all of this has been drawn up and are

15 contained in the annexes to the reports. These annexes can be found at

16 the end of my summary report, but I will say that these discrepancies were

17 minor discrepancies and did not in any way question the diagnosis which

18 had been made on the type of wound or the cause of death. These were

19 minor mistakes which did not question the general conclusions which my

20 colleagues had come to.

21 Q. Thank you, Doctor. Before we move to the individual sites, can I

22 ask you one or two general questions. These autopsies were generally

23 performed some two or three months after the persons were killed and many

24 of these bodies were exhumed. Can you just expand briefly, if you can, on

25 the area of your report that is entitled "Status of the Body." What

1 difficulties in particular does the fact that many of these bodies were

2 skeletonised, partially or fully decomposed, many of them were burnt, what

3 challenges would these present to the person who conducted these forensic

4 examinations?

5 MR. IVETIC: Your Honours, I think I have an objection to the

6 first part of that question, that is to say, the sentence dealing

7 with "these autopsies were generally performed some two or three months

8 after the persons were killed and many of these bodies were exhumed." I

9 think to ask the question that way doesn't really provide a foundation for

10 knowledge of when these individuals or corpses were deceased. And in any

11 event, I believe that the doctor will rightly not be able to -- in his

12 profession I believe there's always a suggestion or an indication of a

13 particular time-period, but depending on the circumstances it may not be

14 able to be tied down as specifically as counsel is indicating. And to

15 make a broad statement covering these many sites in that manner, I think,

16 misstates the evidence that the doctor has presented in his report and

17 that I expect he will present here. And I think if the question is based

18 upon that kind of assertion, there's a lack of foundation for it.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Did you mean to be that specific, Mr. Stamp, or

20 were you simply --

21 MR. STAMP: I could make it a general question.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. You're not suggesting that the period is one

23 of two or three months specifically, are you?

24 MR. STAMP: No, Your Honour. It varies.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: All you're saying is that because of the passage of

1 time and the effect of the earth upon the bodies and indeed in some

2 instances fire, it made forensic examination more challenging that it

3 might otherwise have been.

4 MR. STAMP: Indeed.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: And you're asking for the doctor's comments on

6 that.

7 MR. STAMP: Indeed, Your Honour.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Can you deal with that, please, Dr. Baccard.

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour. You did sum it up

10 appropriately. The forensic doctor and the expert, in general terms,

11 comes up against greater difficulty as time passes and the victim has died

12 a longer while ago. What we do have available to us, data which can be

13 less and less used because a body deteriorates over time, and it is easy

14 to state a number of things when the body is a fresh body. The post

15 mortem examination will be more difficult when we are faced with a

16 putrified body. There are several stages in the putrifaction process, and

17 with increasing difficulty we will have to deal with mummified bodies; in

18 other words, bodies where the skin has been dehydrated and there's only

19 the skin left. Greater difficulties are encountered when we are faced

20 with bodies which have been skeletonised, where there are no soft tissues

21 left anymore, and we are left with the sole skeleton. We also run into

22 serious difficulties when we are faced with what we call body parts or

23 remains, parts of the body which have been partially destroyed by fire,

24 for instance.

25 And it is easy to understand that if we are faced with a wound in

1 the abdomen, that the wound has altered the organs and the muscular mass

2 and has not affected the skeleton, that is one thing. When you have a

3 skeletonised corpse, i.e., a skeleton, you will find no trace whatsoever

4 on the victim. In that case you have to use whole sways of arguments and

5 draw conclusions from the immediate vicinity; namely, you have to look at

6 clothing, you have to look at defects on the clothes, like holes in the

7 clothes. For instance, if a projectile has gone through the clothing,

8 these holes can be surrounded by a bloodstain which can confirm not only

9 that this is rather typical, that there has been a wound and that the

10 wound has bled, and one can also closer to the skeleton find deformed

11 projectiles. And all of this has to be put together, of course.

12 MR. STAMP:

13 Q. If we could, Doctor, turn to your report dealing with the Bela

14 Crkva area. That is page 27.

15 MR. STAMP: This paragraph, 75(B), and it's Schedule B in the

16 indictment, relates to those areas of the indictment, Your Honours.

17 Q. This is an exhumation, an autopsy, done by the British forensic

18 team. You had indicated earlier that they used external examinations and

19 X-rays. At 2.2.2.2, "Methodology," is that what you're referring to when

20 you speak of fluoroscopic screening and external examination?

21 A. That's correct, Prosecutor.

22 Q. You also reviewed the autopsy reports and found that the cause of

23 death in respect to the 54 victims that were exhumed was mainly the result

24 of gun-shot wounds. And I refer in particular to 2.2.4.1, at page 29.

25 A. That's correct.

1 MR. STAMP: Could we bring up Exhibit P0097.

2 Your Honours, subject to the direction of the Court, I don't

3 propose to go through these autopsy reports, just to refer to one or two

4 points in each one. They are quite extensive.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: This is a good example, Mr. Stamp, of where I would

6 expect you to cover the ground fairly quickly. See what the

7 cross-examination concentrates on and, if necessary, deal with issues in

8 re-examination.

9 MR. STAMP: Indeed. Indeed.

10 If we could quickly go to page 4 of that document.

11 Q. Here we see a chart in respect to the victims who were identified

12 and a summary of the cause of death. For example, the fourth-to-last

13 person there is Nesim Popaj, and the cause of death is multiple gun-shot

14 wounds. And above that you have Shendet Popaj, and the cause of death is

15 gun-shot wound to the head.

16 A. That's correct. The gun-shot wounds were in the majority in this

17 sample of victims. This concerned 82 -- 98 per cent of the victims.

18 Q. The document here, the exhibit here, is the material referred to

19 in your report under the heading "Supporting Documents," and that's at

20 2.2.1 on page 27.

21 A. Yes, that's correct. If that was a question, yes, the answer is

22 yes.

23 Q. Generally speaking, how were the identifications made in respect

24 to these, the various autopsies?

25 A. Let me remind you, Prosecutor, that I did not take part in post

1 mortem examination. I did not conduct these. According to what is stated

2 in the report written by Dr. Vanezis, these post mortem examinations and

3 the identification process was conducted by relatives of the victims. And

4 at the time Dr. Vanezis conducted his post mortem examination, there were

5 42 victims that had been identified by relatives, out of 42, so 12

6 remained unidentified.

7 Q. Could we look at page 49 --

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Stamp, does this document, by its title which

9 you revealed when you showed us the first page, not indicate that there

10 may also have been police officers --

11 MR. STAMP: Indeed --

12 JUDGE BONOMY: -- involved in the identification process?

13 MR. STAMP: Indeed.

14 Could we have a look at page 49 of the same document.

15 MR. IVETIC: Which document? We've been talking about two.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: I think we're --

17 MR. STAMP: P97.

18 Perhaps if we could go back to page 47 quickly, 48.

19 Q. We see here that a part of the material is in the statement of a

20 member of the British team, Detective Constable Clive Donner. And if we

21 look at the next page, you see in the middle of the page: "On 30th of

22 June, 1999, I was present with Mr. Sabri Popaj. I attended the mortuary

23 and, through the interpreter Mr. Arben Abdullahu, identified the above

24 bodies as follows," and he listed the bodies, including, by way of

25 example, those noted at 5 from the bottom of the page and 6 from the

1 bottom of the page, Nesim Popaj and Shendet Popaj. Do you observe that,

2 Doctor?

3 A. Yes, I do.

4 Q. In a general sense, does this respect the system of identification

5 that was used in respect to these autopsies?

6 A. Yes, it is. This is what I was trying to sum up a while ago when

7 I stated that the identification was conducted by the relatives.

8 Q. Thank you, Doctor.

9 MR. STAMP: Could we -- Your Honours, before we move to the next

10 one, may I just indicate that there are the reports for Mala Krusa -

11 that's P110 - and I think one could follow the reports of the various

12 sites on the notification. I do not intend to go through all of these,

13 although I had planned to. I think I could move on to Djakovica, which is

14 P249. And Djakovica is referred to in the report at page 33 -- I beg your

15 pardon, at page 35 -- again, I beg your pardon, it's page 37.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, it starts at 33 --

17 MR. STAMP: Page 33 is --

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Oh, I see, it's a different part. Milosh Giliq

19 Street, yeah.

20 MR. STAMP: Can I indicate first, Your Honours, that the report,

21 as indicated by Dr. Baccard in his expert report, is P249 and done by

22 William Rodriguez, the Chief Medical Examiner of the US Ground Forces;

23 however, it covers not only the relevant site but it goes on to cover some

24 other sites. I think this is another situation as referred to by my

25 learned friend Mr. Ivetic, and therefore we would ...

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Help him along the way.

2 You say that P249 is identified by Dr. Baccard in his report.

3 Where do I see that?

4 MR. STAMP: Well, it's not identified as 249. At page 37, 2.5.1,

5 "Supporting Documents. This report is established from the report of Dr.

6 William C. Rodriguez III, Ph.D., Chief Medical Examiner, Special

7 Investigations, Office of the Armed Forces of the United States, Armed

8 Forces Medical Examiner, on October 13th, 1999." P249 refers to that

9 document. And we will, as indicated to the Court -- we are not relying on

10 those parts. I think it's easy to see the parts which are not referred to

11 here.

12 Q. There are one or two questions in respect to that report which I

13 would like to ask you very quickly, Dr. Baccard.

14 Firstly, you said that all but one of the victims were either

15 female or undetermined. And if we look through the report, we see at

16 various places that the medical examiner described the condition of burnt,

17 partly skeletonised body fragments and, for example, at page 2, says that

18 the chin portion configuration is consistent with that of an adult

19 female. "In respect to bone cluster 4, he says a gracile morphology of

20 the cranial fragments indicate the remains to represent an adult female."

21 How, in circumstances where, as in this case, burnt body fragments

22 are recovered, is the determination of sex made?

23 A. My answer will be of a general nature. Yes, it is possible

24 indeed, depending on the kind of bone you find, it is possible to

25 determine the gender of the victim. On an anthropological -- forensic

1 anthropological basis, some part of the anatomy have a great significance

2 when determining the gender. I'm thinking in particular of the cranium,

3 in particular the basis of cranium. And as you quite rightly said, the

4 chin, the angle of the chin is very useful as well. What can also help to

5 determine the gender are the bones of the pelvis. That can give a very

6 good indication when it comes to gender.

7 Apart from these types of bones that can help determine the

8 gender, there are other factors that are taken into account with less

9 significance. It's the robustness of the bones, of the thigh bone, et

10 cetera.

11 You can also base your determination on the examination of the

12 teeth; that can give you some indication about gender. But the main parts

13 of bones that can help you to render a conclusion are the pelvis and the

14 cranium, and the skull.

15 Q. And briefly, the examiners found the body parts of at least 12

16 children.

17 A. Yes, that's correct.

18 Q. Without going through the various examples given in the report

19 itself, how, generally speaking, is this determination made? I imagine,

20 of course, that the size of the bones, but sometimes you might have small

21 adults or large children, relatively. What can you say about how age is

22 determined when you find body parts in this condition?

23 A. When it comes to the bones, apart from the size of the bones, that

24 can be very misleading because you have adults who are very small and some

25 children who, on the other hand, are very, very tall. So what you do is

1 you look at the cartilage, the level of articulation, for example. And

2 when you look at the various parts of the bones, you can determine the

3 age, the fusion level of the bones; you can determine the age that -- with

4 a good significance. Statistically speaking, the articular places are

5 very significant at the skull level. The interior part of the clavicle,

6 of the ribs, especially of the fourth rib, some bones of the pelvis, some

7 bones of the wrist are very significant. And with all this you can try to

8 determine the age of the skeleton.

9 Q. Thank you, Doctor. It is noted in the report -- in your report

10 and the report of Dr. Rodriguez at more than one place that there were

11 signs of the activity of scavenging animals on these bones and body

12 remains. And according to Dr. Rodriguez, various bits of bones and burnt

13 body parts were found in various places in the house. Is it possible that

14 some of these bits and pieces of body parts might have been moved by

15 scavenging animals?

16 A. When you have scavenging, you are faced with an additional

17 difficulty. Earlier I mentioned a number of difficulties we are faced

18 with when you conduct post mortem examinations very late. So in that

19 particular instance, they were confronted with a lot of problems because

20 these bodies were skeletonised, first of all; secondly, these bones had

21 been partially burned; and thirdly, animals had bitten parts of these

22 bones -- gnawed at these bones.

23 Q. Is it possible animals could have moved the fragments within the

24 house?

25 A. Yes, that's perfectly possible.

1 Q. Thank you. Could we move on quickly to -- before I move on, there

2 are just one or two things I just recalled. If we look at Exhibit P2494,

3 Djakovica, at page 2 it says: "Examination of this crime scene and

4 associated remains took place on May 25th to 27th, 1999."

5 MR. STAMP: And, Your Honours, if you examine the dates of the

6 examination of the various rooms on the remainder of the exhibit, you will

7 see the 26th of June, 1999. It is clear that that date at the top of the

8 report is an error. I just point that out.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

10 MR. STAMP:

11 Q. And you -- it is transcribed, if I may put it that way, at pages

12 5316 to 5317 of the transcript in the Milosevic case that you said that

13 the wounds were most likely cause by explosions. Did you have an

14 opportunity in that regard to review the French transcript of what you

15 said in the Milosevic case, and is that a proper recording of what you

16 meant or what you said? In other words, is it your opinion that the

17 wounds were most likely caused by explosions and is there any basis for

18 any opinion like that?

19 A. No, Prosecutor. I noted this discrepancy when I testified in the

20 Milosevic trial. I spoke French when I testified, and when I answered the

21 question I said no, so I can't have said that these wounds were most

22 likely caused by explosions. I think this must have been an

23 interpretation error.

24 Q. Thank you. If we could move on quickly to the Izbica site. This

25 site presented quite a significant amount of difficulties because of the

1 paucity of material you had to work on. And you did in your report at

2 2.7.5 - and that's page 44 - indicate that the cause of death was very

3 difficult to determine having regard to the material. And further, you

4 indicated that there were limitations to your observations made in respect

5 of the video and the photographs. I think in your appendix at page 93 you

6 said the diagnoses can't be given with certainty.

7 I'd like to ask you this, however: In respect to the findings

8 that some persons were shot at close range because of the marks of a twin

9 or burning or muzzle marks on the skin, the findings that they were shot

10 at close range can be given with reasonable scientific certainty.

11 A. Yes. The Izbica case is a difficult one. You were on a --

12 insofar as the work conducted by the forensic French medical team came up

13 against the fact that there are very few body remains left. And they did

14 find clothes and body remains, but on the basis of the body remains one

15 could not find any traces of wounds. But some of the clothing did contain

16 defects which would be consistent with holes made by gun-shots. Some of

17 the edges of these holes were burnt, which led some ballistic expert to

18 say that the shot had been fired at short range. That's the first point.

19 Second point is that alongside these direct-examination reports

20 conducted on the crime sites I was given a videotape, and on this

21 videotape there were shots of a series of victims on which a number of

22 findings could be made. Of course, these were not shots for scientific

23 purposes. These were limited in material because the victims were lying

24 on their backs and they were all dressed. And only certain anatomical

25 parts of the body could be seen, and some of the shots were sometimes

1 blurred and were photographed from quite a distance, and the wounds could

2 not be measured in any way. So to sum up, only some of the photographs

3 could be interpreted from a forensic point of view.

4 The third point I wanted to make was this was only an analysis of

5 documents and video pictures. This can in no way replace examination

6 conducted on the victim or post mortem examination. This has a limited

7 value. That said, I was able to state two things.

8 Firstly, this videotape seemed to be authentic and true to fact

9 because some of the details that could be seen there is not something you

10 could make up; things like putrifaction phenomena or the way the bodies

11 were placed, the victims were placed. And all this was consistent and

12 seemed sincere because I did think that maybe some of this had been staged

13 or maybe it was fake.

14 Also, in addition, on some of these shots you could see wounds

15 which were consistent with -- I never used the word "certainty" in my

16 report. I just said one or other shot or picture was consistent with

17 wounds that could be caused by a gun-shot. Some could be caused by

18 fire-arms; some could be areas where the print of the muzzle of the weapon

19 could be seen. Other cases there were charred remains on the edge, and in

20 other instances, traces of powder.

21 Q. In respect of those cases that you referred to in your report

22 where there were ballistics burn marks on the clothing or on the skin,

23 could the -- or is the finding that these persons were shot from close

24 range, is that a finding that is scientific and sustainable, in your view,

25 notwithstanding the paucity of evidence otherwise?

1 A. I'm unable to answer this question directly because these finding

2 were made by the experts. And the clothing was not made available to me

3 so I was unavailable to examine the latter. I had no access to the

4 photographs and was therefore unable to conduct a second examination.

5 What I can say, however, is that these findings were made by

6 experts who are well-known and well-reputed experts in their own country.

7 They are used to these type of examinations, and I have no reason to

8 question their findings.

9 MR. STAMP: May I just indicate to the Court that in the course of

10 his penultimate answer he referred to a video. The video was in evidence

11 through witness Liri Loshi, the video and the pictures from the video.

12 And may I also indicate that it is indicated in the report that this is a

13 situation where the bodies -- where no bodies were recovered.

14 Q. Among the material which you used or which you reviewed was a

15 ballistic report, if you could check your report, that was issued by the

16 French team.

17 A. The report entitled "Forensic Examination" was something which was

18 made available to you. Dominique Gaillardon and his colleagues gave me

19 this document. I'm sorry, it's not Dominique Gaillardon and his

20 colleagues who gave me this document. This was given to me, the document

21 was given to me by the Office of the Prosecutor, the OTP.

22 Q. Very well. Included in those documents was a ballistic report by

23 the team; do you recall that?

24 A. Yes, I think that's right.

25 MR. IVETIC: Your Honour, if we could have some specificity. I

1 believe there's actually two; one contained within the autopsy section

2 itself that relates to wound ballistics and one which relates to a

3 different type of ballistics. There is a difference.

4 MR. STAMP: Could we look at Exhibit P00210.

5 Could we move on to the next page of the French.

6 Q. Do you recall receiving and using that document or would you like

7 to see some more of it?

8 A. Yes, that looks familiar.

9 Q. And I see at page 48 of your report, page 47 to 48 of the report,

10 you refer to the observation of the injuries or the -- well, the

11 observation of the injuries being consistent with injuries arising from

12 7.62-calibre ammunition. And also at page 46 you refer to the French

13 report in which collected cartridge cases concerning 7.62 calibre were

14 used in coming to certain findings. That is at the top of page 46.

15 MR. IVETIC: If this is a question, I believe it misstates the

16 evidence in the report. As I read it, it says, "consistent with

17 projectiles of 7.62 or 12 calibre," that would be "12-bore," I believe.

18 MR. STAMP:

19 Q. For the time being I'm not showing you this part of the report.

20 Did the French forensic team use a ballistic analysis of some of the

21 projectiles found in the graves and at the scene to assist them coming to

22 the conclusion that they made?

23 A. Yes, Prosecutor, and that's quite right. Just to respond to the

24 previous remark. On page 45 and 46 of my report, 2.7.4.2, "Type of

25 Weapon," it is clearly mentioned that the diameter and the defects found

1 on the clothing are compatible with calibre 12, which does not mean

2 12-millimetre but calibre 12, and calibre 7.62. This is clearly mentioned

3 and there is no discrepancy.

4 Q. Could you explain a little bit further. What's -- I read it here

5 at page --

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ivetic -- just a second.

7 Mr. Ivetic, whether it's "and" or "or" doesn't really seem to

8 matter here, does it?

9 MR. IVETIC: No. Just that's what I said. The question, as it

10 was phrased, indicated that it was exclusively 7.62. I agree with the

11 doctor.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: What the report that we're looking at says is that

13 either would be consistent, but you then add to that the fact that what's

14 found are cartridge cases of a 7.62 calibre.

15 MR. IVETIC: Correct.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

17 Mr. Stamp.

18 MR. STAMP: Thank you, Your Honour.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: The break will be at quarter to today.

20 MR. STAMP: Very well.

21 Q. Could we have a look quickly at your report in respect to Kacanik,

22 the Kotlina site and Kacanik. And in the meantime we could look at

23 Exhibit P00361.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Before we move on to that, there's no problem about

25 it being on the screen. It was P210 you took exception to, Mr. Ivetic,

1 and that's the one we've just been looking at; is that correct?

2 MR. IVETIC: It's been mentioned as being one that he looked at,

3 but it's not been elicited what portions he looked at or what specific

4 findings there were. There were -- his report lists ballistic findings

5 and there were, I believe, ballistic findings in the report relating to

6 Izbica which would have been, I believe, 209 --

7 JUDGE BONOMY: But the reference in 2.7.6.2 is a reference to

8 P210. Is that correct?

9 MR. IVETIC: It's hard to say, Your Honour. It could also fall

10 under the "Other Observations." There were three French forensic team

11 reports dealing with Izbica and they all tend to deal with various aspects

12 of the examination of clothing and the artefacts that were found. So I

13 don't know. My objection --

14 JUDGE BONOMY: The ballistic report is P210, is it?

15 MR. IVETIC: That is correct, the one that is labelled as the

16 ballistic report.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. Now, it's plain from the evidence of the

18 witness that parts of that ballistic report at least must be admissible.

19 MR. IVETIC: I agree.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. So again, although you took exception to the

21 whole of it, I think, again this must be a document that depends upon

22 agreement or, failing agreement, a determination. But in view of the fact

23 that some of it must be acceptable or admissible, is this not another item

24 that goes back to discussion between you and Mr. Stamp?

25 MR. IVETIC: I believe we can attempt that, yes.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

2 You can now carry on with Kacanik, Mr. Stamp.

3 MR. STAMP: Thank you, Your Honour.

4 Q. There were four Kacanik sites. The first one we could look at is

5 Kotlina, and that's at page 49 of the report -- 48 of the report. This

6 was a situation where 84 per cent of the autopsy findings indicated that

7 the persons died from the effects of explosions. And that is at 2.9.4.2.

8 I'd like to look quickly at one or two areas of Exhibit 361.

9 Could we go to page 6 of that exhibit. That, sir, is a list of the

10 persons that were recovered from the two wells, that were exhumed from the

11 two wells, and that were identified, that and the next page; that's

12 correct?

13 A. Yes, Prosecutor, that's correct. Twenty-one people were

14 identified, and the names figure on this list. Five -- at the time I

15 drafted my report, five were still unidentified.

16 MR. STAMP: And if we could just move quickly to page 9 of that

17 exhibit.

18 Q. This is the -- this is one of the autopsy reports that you

19 reviewed, the report on the remains of Izijah Loku.

20 A. That's correct.

21 MR. STAMP: And following thereon, may I just indicate to the

22 Court that the autopsy report for body parts -- bodies and body parts in

23 respect to a number of these listed persons -- not a number, all of these

24 listed persons, many of whom appear in the schedule, which is schedule --

25 one of the schedules of the indictment.

1 Q. Doctor, I won't go through all the autopsy reports. I'd like to

2 take you to page 42 of that document which you reviewed. Page 42 lists

3 evidence that was recovered -- could I ask you this: It is a common thing

4 in forensic examination to send off artefacts recovered for further

5 chemical or scientific examination; is that correct, Doctor?

6 A. Yes, that's correct.

7 Q. If you look at the bottom of the page, you will see that some of

8 the recovered evidence at 5 was "fire debris from shaft wall of upper

9 well; 6, clothing remnants to be investigated for traces of incendiary or

10 explosive material." And if we look at the next page, we also see "debris

11 from fire or explosion" at 19. And if we go to page 88 of the same

12 exhibit, we see in the middle of the page: "Material submitted for

13 examination: Samples 5, 6, and 19," corresponding to those we just looked

14 at.

15 And if we could go to page 91. The finding of the Chief of the

16 Austrian Forensic Chemistry Unit, Dr. Hirz, was, in the middle of the

17 page, "the presence of TNT could be established for certain in sample 19

18 and probably in sample 6 only with the aid of more sensitive gas

19 chromatographic method. Traces of TNT in sample 5 could not be ruled

20 out."

21 Doctor, is this methodology an approach, an approach as standard

22 and proper method of examining fragments that have been recovered from a

23 crime scene, fragments of various materials or artefacts?

24 A. Prosecutor, first of all, I'm discovering for the first time the

25 findings of this examination, and as you can see on reading my report,

1 this had not been given to me.

2 As far as your question is concerned, i.e., whether it is

3 customary to give this kind of artefact to a qualified laboratory so that

4 one can detect traces of explosives, this is, of course, part and parcel

5 of a complete examination when a crime scene investigation is conducted

6 and forensic examination is conducted. To be more specific, as far as the

7 methods are concerned, I'm not an expert in explosives, and in chemistry,

8 not either. I have some knowledge, general knowledge, of which kinds of

9 methods I use and spectrometry mass-spectrometry and chromatography in

10 gaseous phase are standard methods used when this kind of analysis is

11 conducted. But as I'm not an expert, I cannot expand on this any further.

12 Q. Thank you. What I was asking, I think you've answered that. It

13 is acceptable practice for a forensic scientist to send away material like

14 that to be examined by a chemist or an expert in that field.

15 A. Yes.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: What do you say is the status of material,

17 Mr. Stamp, that the witness hasn't reviewed?

18 MR. STAMP: This material is part of the complete report by the

19 Austrian forensic team, which I had thought had been submitted to him

20 because it is part of the overall report.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, you may have to reflect on that. You can

22 since it's now the time for us to break.

23 Dr. Baccard, the usher will take you and show you where you can

24 wait while we have our break. You can now please leave the courtroom.

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

1 [The witness stands down]

2 JUDGE BONOMY: And we shall resume at 11.15.

3 --- Recess taken at 10.47 a.m.

4 --- On resuming at 11.16 a.m.

5 [The witness takes the stand]

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Stamp.

7 MR. STAMP: Thank you, Mr. President.

8 If you could bring back Exhibit P361.

9 Q. And while we're waiting, Doctor, in respect to the Kotlina case,

10 you said at page 48, at 2.8.1: "Supporting Documents. The report is

11 based on the report of the Austrian Crime Scene Group II."

12 MR. STAMP: Could we go to the front page of 361. First page,

13 please. Could you go to page 2.

14 Q. In the top box, it says: "Crime Scene Group II 1999 Kosovo." Is

15 that the report you received?

16 A. Yes, I believe so.

17 Q. The report, as it is, contains the autopsies that I showed you,

18 but it also contains a record of the material collected and the submission

19 for chemical examination. You said you did not review that record. Am I

20 to understand that in this case you reviewed as source material the

21 autopsy reports but you did not review the documentation in respect to the

22 submission of the artefacts for chemical analysis?

23 A. I must say that during the break I tried to recollect this

24 particular case - this goes back four years already - and my answer is not

25 quite certain as it was before. It is possible that the results of these

1 chemical analyses were shown to me, but because of my particular

2 background, of my profession, I dealt mostly with what was within my field

3 of expertise, i.e., the autopsy reports. I cannot say with any certainty

4 whether the results of the chemical analysis were to be found in the

5 report that was given to me.

6 Q. Very well.

7 MR. STAMP: Your Honour, I can only indicate to the Court that the

8 report of the chemical analysis forms part of the overall document. It's

9 a pretty long document, and the submission for analysis is at the back of

10 it.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: The submission for analysis is one thing, but you

12 also have the result of the analysis, do you?

13 MR. STAMP: Yes.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, how does it affect the conclusion on page 51

15 of Dr. Baccard's report? And it may indeed -- because it's -- it extends

16 over all the Kacanik cases, does it, and therefore -- or is it only this

17 section of Kacanik --

18 MR. STAMP: Kotlina, only Kotlina.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Only Kotlina. So how does it affect the conclusion

20 at 2.9.5?

21 MR. STAMP: It confirms the conclusion to the degree that where

22 the conclusion refers to 84 per cent of the victims, the cause of death is

23 relating to explosives. But more than that, it confirms the evidence of

24 Hazbi Loku, who testified in the case, that he saw the men being thrown in

25 the wells, some being shot, and that when they were in the wells,

1 explosives were thrown in. I believe at the time he testified there was

2 some issue raised as to whether or not he saw what he said he saw and

3 whether or not explosives were used.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, the removal of doubt may be achieved by

5 agreement. Again, this is a matter we would invite you and Mr. Ivetic to

6 consider, and it may be that agreement can be reached and you do not have

7 the difficulty of establishing by extraneous means the views expressed

8 following the chemical analysis. But in view of the doubt that

9 Dr. Baccard has expressed about whether he saw the results, then it would

10 do us well to overcome any possible lacuna by agreement.

11 MR. STAMP: Very well, Your Honour.

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, if I may, I'd like to

13 add something. In my report, I mention the diagnosis, the conclusions,

14 based on the autopsies and on the external examination, but also based on

15 the presence of shrapnels. But I did not refer to anything being

16 confirmed by chemical analysis. It's something new that I discover now.

17 But in any case, if you look at my colleagues' reports, the anatomical

18 injuries and the shrapnels were sufficient to confirm the diagnosis of

19 death caused by an explosion, by explosives.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Doctor.

21 Mr. Stamp.

22 MR. STAMP: Thank you, Your Honour.

23 Could we move on to Dubrava.

24 Your Honours, I see here in respect to Dubrava and the remaining

25 crime scenes that what we have are pretty straightforward exhumation

1 reports and autopsies. Unless the Court is of the view that I should go

2 through the autopsies, it is probably not a matter that needs to be taken

3 now.

4 For Dubrava, there are two exhumation reports, P370 and P371,

5 followed by the autopsy reports in respect to identified persons in the

6 schedules of the indictment. Similarly, if one follows the notification

7 in the Vata Slatina case, the situation remains the same. In Stagovo,

8 there is another report by the Swiss Disaster Victim Identification Team,

9 and it includes the autopsies in respect to the named individuals in the

10 indictment. I don't think it's necessary to go through these autopsies.

11 What I could do, Your Honours, if it is convenient to the Court,

12 is file or present to the Court a schedule with the relevant pages,

13 because I think one or two of these reports are very long and the gravamen

14 of the autopsies are located in a narrow range of pages but scattered in

15 the report. In other words, there are many photographs, there are

16 pictures of delta structures, et cetera, in the report followed by the

17 autopsies in respect of -- there's a narrative of the autopsies in respect

18 to the individual victims.

19 So I would proceed that way, having regard to what was indicated

20 by the Court earlier, unless the Court thinks it is convenient to proceed

21 through the individual autopsies now.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: We don't require you to do that, Mr. Stamp, but we

23 do require you to identify the exhibits to which the witness is referring

24 or upon which he has relied in respect of each section.

25 MR. STAMP: Very well, Your Honour.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: And where you -- I don't mean at this minute, but

2 it would have been helpful if a list was already available which

3 identified the pages where you've indicated that there's a lengthy report

4 and we need only refer to certain parts of it.

5 Now, hopefully, along with the exercise that you and Mr. Ivetic

6 are to engage in by Wednesday, you'll be able to give us a list of

7 exhibits to which this report refers, along with a restriction to the

8 pages that are relevant to the issues that we have to address.

9 MR. STAMP: Very well, Your Honour.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, I note one other matter. Are you continuing

11 with the examination or have you reached the end of it?

12 MR. STAMP: Two matters I want to cover very briefly in respect to

13 Vucitrn.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Very well.

15 MR. STAMP:

16 Q. You deal with the site Gornja Sudimlja, in the municipality of

17 Vucitrn, at page 67. I see that in the Milosevic case, at page 5263, you

18 said that as a general rule you would be able to independently detect even

19 an error as to the cause of death from the material furnished. If we look

20 at appendix 7, at page 149. I think if we can go to page 147, not 149.

21 Now, at case C16, third from the bottom, you say, in conclusion,

22 the cause of death in respect to this person is not "the thoracic wound

23 because the shot was very tangential and superficial. It is not a

24 penetrating shot. The cause of death is skull/brain injury."

25 Now, is that a situation where you could, as a result of your

1 expertise and examination material provided, come to your own conclusion

2 with respect to cause of death?

3 A. Yes. When you have a description of both wounds and when you have

4 the relevant pictures available to you, it's quite possible to say that

5 the thoracic wound did not cause any lesion in vital organs and that the

6 cause of death is related to the skull/brain injury that was accompanied

7 with irreversible lesions, for example, injury to the brain.

8 Q. And in respect to that site, you found a significant amount of

9 discrepancies or errors. Did these errors in any way affect the overall

10 conclusions, particularly that most of the victims or a significant amount

11 of the victims had been shot in the back?

12 A. No -- yes, you're right. When I looked at the documents that were

13 available and the photographs as well, I was able to identify a number of

14 discrepancies. But once I had taken note of these discrepancies, and

15 taking these discrepancies into account, I can say that the overall

16 conclusion remained valid.

17 Q. I referred you to one overall conclusion about them being shot in

18 the back. Is also another important conclusion at page 67, 2.12.6.4,

19 where you say:

20 "The majority of the wounds at the level of the trunk,

21 abdominal/thoracic region, that's 58 per cent, and at the level of head

22 and neck, cervical/cephalic region, 37 per cent. No case of gun-shot

23 injury was found concerning the lower limbs, and a few has been done to

24 the upper limbs, 5 per cent. These findings must be interpreted with the

25 circumstances of the firing."

1 I take it also that these findings are not affected by the

2 discrepancies that you observed.

3 A. No, because the percentages, the figures that I give, are figures

4 that I have computed myself based on all the information available to me

5 and taking into account all the discrepancies that I identified.

6 Q. Thank you, Doctor. In respect to the Suva Reka site, this, again,

7 was an exhumation of a burial ground that had already been exhumed of the

8 bodies. Or may I put it this way: There were just two identifiable

9 bodies, in your view. Can you explain or expand on the reasons why there

10 were only two identifiable bodies.

11 A. I read the material that was given to me, various anthropological

12 reports prepared by Dr. Black, the autopsy report of Dr. Milewski, the

13 anthropological report of Dr. Black prepared at another date, and so on

14 and so forth, and when reading these reports I identified a number of

15 discrepancies. Because the description of some of the clusters of human

16 remains did not add up, because of these discrepancies, I decided to leave

17 aside that which was doubtful and only take into account and retain what I

18 could find in every one of the reports and that would not -- and that

19 would not be a cause for confusion.

20 Q. And as a result you have only listed cause of death in respect to

21 Faton Berisha and Fatime Berisha.

22 A. Yes, that's correct, because as for the other human remains, they

23 were in such a state, they were commingled and there was no lesion to be

24 found on any of these human remains that could have enabled us to

25 determine the cause of death.

1 MR. STAMP: As I indicated, Your Honours, the report in respect to

2 Cirez, the eight women found in Cirez, is already in evidence and speaks

3 for itself. That is P383. I have nothing further in chief.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: It may be, I think, Mr. Stamp, that you haven't, in

5 relation to the transcript, asked the normal questions about whether the

6 witness, subject to the amendment that you did go into, would give that

7 evidence today if he were asked the same questions.

8 MR. STAMP: I did not? Well, I should.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: I think so.

10 MR. STAMP: Thank you very much, Your Honour.

11 Q. On the occasions when you testified in the Milosevic trial, did

12 you answer truthfully to the questions you were asked to the extent that

13 if you were asked again, would your answers remain the same?

14 A. Of course, sir. Yes, of course.

15 Q. Thank you very much.

16 MR. STAMP: May I also indicate before I sit that the updated CV

17 is in the system at P2784.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

19 MR. STAMP: Thank you very much.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. O'Sullivan.

21 MR. O'SULLIVAN: Your Honour, we'll follow the order of the

22 indictment, and I have no questions.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila.

24 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

1 MR. VISNJIC: I have questions, Your Honour.

2 Cross-examination by Mr. Visnjic:

3 Q. [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Dr. Baccard. My name is Tomislav

4 Visnjic. I am General Ojdanic's Defence counsel and I have a few

5 questions for you. Like any layperson, I'm going to put a few general

6 questions to you. So could you please give me answers in order for me to

7 lay a foundation for some other questions that I wish to put to you after

8 that.

9 Is it correct, Doctor, that the distance of firing a bullet is

10 established on the basis of the traces of gunpowder of the explosion?

11 A. Yes, that's correct. A number of criterion enable one to

12 establish the distance at which it was fired, but it's not the only

13 criterion. There can also be traces which have to do with ammunition

14 constituents. In the case of certain projectiles or filling material,

15 like polystyrene and lesions which are connected to the gas, for instance,

16 some lesions have nothing to do with powder traces. There can be just

17 tears in the body.

18 Q. So in addition -- thank you.

19 So in addition to the powder traces that would consist of

20 particles that have not burned and traces of metal and precisely what you

21 referred to in your answer, those would be the elements on the basis of

22 which we could establish what the distance of the fired bullet is; is that

23 right?

24 A. That's correct.

25 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Could the witness be asked

1 to repeat the ammunition constituents, please.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, just a moment.

3 Dr. Baccard, could you repeat what you said about the constituents

4 of the ammunition.

5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, absolutely, Your Honour. I

6 said that notwithstanding powder traces, powder traces is part of

7 ammunition, but there are other things that can be taken into account.

8 The stuffing which is part of a projectile, or if it's a multiple

9 projectile, in addition to the powder there can be a filling material for

10 certain kinds of American projectiles which are not powder but which

11 stabilise these elements. This is projected into the air when the shot is

12 fired.

13 In the case of pressed, short-range shots, we have characteristic

14 lesions which are connected to the expansion of the gas under the skin

15 which cause torn wounds, without one being able to find any traces of

16 gunpowder. So a powder projection are part and parcel of what enable us

17 to establish the firing range, but this is not the only factor to be borne

18 in mind.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

20 Mr. Visnjic.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

22 Q. Is it correct that absolute proximity or immediate proximity means

23 that the barrel of a hand-held weapon was, when the firing occurred,

24 leaning on an object or a body part or was a few millimetres away from it?

25 A. That's correct, yes.

1 Q. Is it correct that relative or indirect proximity means that the

2 barrel of a hand-held weapon was, during firing, removed from a body or

3 from clothing at a distance of about 15 or 20 centimetres for modern

4 pistols, 50 to 70 centimetres in the case of revolvers, and 1 to 1.5

5 metres for rifles?

6 A. The answer is no. I don't know if the translation is accurate,

7 but the firing range, what you mentioned would be more in line with short

8 range and not long range.

9 Q. The question had to do with relative proximity or indirect

10 proximity or range.

11 A. I think we need to specify here that the subdivisions are purely

12 theoretical. They rely on a number of factors; namely, the type of

13 weapon, the length of the barrel, the powder load, and a number of factors

14 which you mentioned, i.e., if there are clothing in the way. I'm talking

15 about residues, of course, here.

16 MR. STAMP: Before we proceed to the next question, I suspect it

17 is going to be -- it's corrected. There was an error in the transcript.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

19 Q. Is it correct that in all cases where traces are not found,

20 ballistics experts and forensic experts agree that the projectile was

21 fired from a distance?

22 A. The answer can't be categorical because other factors could be

23 borne in mind. The weather conditions, for instance, if it has rained,

24 smoke residues can be washed away; and if there is an intermediary target,

25 like a screen or clothing, if such a thing exists there, we sometimes

1 cannot find traces on the body itself. So I think one has to bear in mind

2 these factors and one cannot answer categorically.

3 Q. These factors that you mentioned, in actual fact they can only

4 lead to a more conservative interpretation of distance, the distance from

5 which a bullet had been fired. Am I right?

6 A. I don't understand the word you use, "conservative."

7 Q. I'll try to deal with it this way: According to the methodology

8 that you use, what would be a mean distance to establish whether a rifle

9 had been fired from close range?

10 A. I'm sorry, but once again I cannot answer categorically. The

11 length of the barrel, whether at the extreme end of the barrel there is a

12 special mechanism which can be a sound muffler, for instance, or a

13 flash-hiding system, or if the quantity of powder is more or less great

14 and weather conditions, all these factors must be taken into account when

15 you consider smoke residues.

16 Q. Are there any standards in literature regarding the distance which

17 can be established?

18 A. The answer is no. Arms ammunition experts, when they calculate a

19 firing shot in numbers, conduct comparative shots using the same weapon

20 whenever it's possible or a similar type of weapon; and if possible, they

21 use munitions that are part of the same batch. And if they're not part of

22 the same batch and not available, then a similar munition is used. This

23 is needed if we are to provide figures. We then have to conduct

24 comparative shootings; otherwise, all of this remains rather approximate,

25 whether it's an intermediary shot, contact range, short range, long

1 range. This, of course, depends on the type of weapon used.

2 Q. Doctor, now I'm going to ask you about the work of the French

3 team, or rather, the French mission in 1999. Do you know what method they

4 used to establish the range involved and what parameters they used for

5 establishing the range at which a bullet had been fired when they wrote

6 this analysis?

7 A. Are you referring to a particular case or is this a general

8 question you are putting to me?

9 Q. Well, perhaps a specific report. Gornja Sudimlja, for instance.

10 A. As far as firing range is concerned, what you find in the report

11 in question depends on whether marks of burns have been found on the

12 clothing, whether powder traces have been found.

13 Q. Doctor, it was my understanding on the basis of the evidence you

14 gave in the Milosevic case that you were not responsible for the work of

15 the French mission in 1999. You assumed responsibility for the work of

16 these teams only in the year 2000. Is that right?

17 A. Yes, that's correct. Nonetheless, at one point, as far as what I

18 did in the year 2000, I was not in charge of the French mission, I was in

19 charge of the purely disciplinary and international teams that were set up

20 by the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICTY. This included experts from

21 different countries. There were not only French experts on the ground.

22 Q. Thank you. Is it correct that on decaying bodies one cannot

23 establish exactly at what range the bullet had been fired?

24 A. As a rule, it is very difficult because of the transudation

25 phenomenon which you find on the skin and the peeling off of the skin,

1 when the epidermis will flake off. This, nonetheless, can be determined

2 by looking at clothes of the victim.

3 Q. Is it also correct, Doctor, that perhaps one can establish that a

4 bullet had been fired from absolute range when we can see on the flat

5 bones of the body that there had been smears with black substance in a

6 situation when a body is already decaying or had already decayed?

7 A. As far as contact range is concerned, you can have a tattooed area

8 which is not on the skin itself but which is located on the external part

9 of the underlying bone. In that case, this tattooed area which is

10 tattooed with powder will be protected by the skin, and it's on the

11 external side of the bone that you will find embedded powder on the

12 outside of the skin -- of the bone.

13 Other clinical signs can be observed. For instance, the print of

14 the muzzle of the weapon, the mine chamber under the skin, and a widening

15 of the hole.

16 Q. Thank you, Doctor. Am I right if I say that, according to your

17 report, 2.12.3, that is, all the corpses found in Gornja Sudimlja had

18 decayed/decomposed, with the exception of two that are mentioned there

19 specifically? 2.12.3.2, that is the reference.

20 A. That's correct.

21 Q. Am I right, Doctor, if I say that it is impossible only on the

22 basis of what the exit/entry wound looks like that one can state what the

23 calibre of the bullet involved was?

24 A. One has to be extremely cautious when doing this. You think it is

25 one or other calibre, but there is no scientific comparison that can be

1 drawn between a calibre and exit and entry wounds which has to do with the

2 elasticity of the skin and the movement of the projectile and resistant

3 factors of the various tissues.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, the reference you've just given,

5 2.12.3.2, I can't find in my copy, and I can see that in this section the

6 numbers do jump around a little. Could it be under a different number in

7 my copy?

8 MR. STAMP: Yes, Your Honour. I probably should have indicated

9 that the numbers do jump around. That is why I tended to refer to the

10 numbers as the page number and the paragraph heading. I think it is

11 "Status of Bodies" at the bottom of the page 2.12.5.2.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: Point 5.2? That clarifies it. Thank you.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, according to what I

14 have in translation, it should be on page 76 in a document -- in document

15 158, out of 158, but now my colleagues are telling me not to refer to it

16 this way.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: On page 76?

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] My colleague Mr. Ivetic tells me now

19 that I cannot rely on this piece of information because the pages in

20 translation obviously do not correspond to the e-court pages. But I think

21 that a reference to the paragraph will suffice.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: But in your copy the paragraph number is 2.12.3.2;

23 is that correct?

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] That's the paragraph, and next to it

25 I see it says in the original "2.12.5.2" to complicate things even

1 further. It was probably first done in French, then translated into

2 English where the numbers got mixed up, and then it was further

3 translated, so all these problems arose.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Actually, I think there's a transposition of a 3

5 and a 5, but it's now been clarified for the moment. Carry on, please.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, in my copy, which has

7 been written in English, I have the same page numbering as Mr. Visnjic.

8 In paragraph 2.12.2, "Status of the Bodies."

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Could you repeat that number, please.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] 2.12.3.2.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

12 Mr. Visnjic.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

14 Q. Doctor, could you please take a look at Exhibit P334, a report

15 from the French mission. I will put a question first and then I will ask

16 you to look at two autopsy reports. The question is the following: On

17 what basis is it claimed that the immediate proximity is equivalent to 50

18 centimetres, bearing in mind that we agreed a little while ago that

19 absolute or immediate proximity is either the weapon against the skin or

20 only a few millimetres away from the skin and the clothing?

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] So if we could see page 51 of

22 Exhibit 334, which is a report for L11, C13.

23 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: L1, C13.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: There may be a translation problem here, because

25 the English says: "Fired at very short range." This was a French report,

1 so -- is that correct or not, Mr. Visnjic? Is this a French report?

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] It's a French report, Your Honour,

3 yes, and it is a matter of translation. Yes.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Dr. Baccard, do you have the original French

5 version of this report?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, Your Honour. I have the English

7 version on my screen.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, the French version is

9 in the system. We could put it on the screen instead of the version in

10 Serbian, and then --

11 JUDGE BONOMY: I think you should, Mr. Visnjic, and let's see how

12 it compares with the English translation, first of all.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the usher please put the

14 French version on the screen. I think it's the same page number.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: It's identical, I think, to the English version.

16 It talks about "a tres courte distance a 50 centimetres environ."

17 So it's what I would say is identical to the English. Now, in

18 Serbian, can we hear from you, Mr. Visnjic, what the equivalent sentence

19 says in Serbian, please.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, in the Serbian version,

21 it says in the conclusion it's a 12-millimetre calibre bullet fired from

22 an immediate proximity at a distance of about 2 centimetres --

23 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: 50 centimetres.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: No, no, please answer the question. That way we

25 understand what the various languages are saying.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

2 Q. Doctor, when you look at this autopsy report, on what basis was it

3 concluded that the distance from which the bullet was fired was about 50

4 centimetres?

5 A. I'm not the expert who conducted the post mortem examination; it

6 is, therefore, difficult to say what material my colleague used to come up

7 with this finding. According to what I read in this report, there was a

8 weapons ammunition expert who was there at the time the post mortem

9 examination was conducted and I think that his findings led to this

10 conclusion.

11 Q. Doctor, in the description of this autopsy -- or in any document

12 you reviewed, is there anything that can provide a basis for such

13 conclusions and is that basis stated anywhere? This description consists

14 of three pages.

15 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

16 pages 2 and 3 of this document, the next two pages, that is.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: In French, preferably.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] These are pages 52 and 53 in French,

19 I believe, 52 and 53.

20 Your Honours --

21 JUDGE BONOMY: We still have English, I'm afraid, Mr. Visnjic.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I have a version in

23 French, a hard copy here, and I can hand it to the doctor.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Very well.

25 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

1 Q. Doctor, the same question refers to L2, 34. So if you could look

2 at both autopsy reports, please.

3 Doctor, in these two reports, is there any element on the basis of

4 which we could conclude that the French team arrived at the conclusion

5 that the bullet was fired at a distance of 50 centimetres?

6 A. It is indicated on the screen that the distance is 50

7 centimetres. I think it would have been better for the expert to indicate

8 that this shot was consistent with rather than providing a figure, i.e.,

9 the distance, which can only be ascertained when we know which kind of

10 weapon and ammunition has been used.

11 That said, we can figure out that it has been shot at close range;

12 for instance, if there are blackish burns around the wound, this is an

13 indication that the muzzle of the barrel of the weapon was very close to

14 the skin.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Is there such a finding in these two reports?

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, as far as the L2, C34

17 report is concerned, in the thoracic region, it is specified that the

18 entry wound is in the paramedian higher part of the thorax, 9 millimetres

19 long, with blackish burns around the area in question. As far as the

20 other report is concerned, L1, 13 -- L1, C13, it is specified that this

21 was shot at short range, at 50 centimetres. But we don't have the

22 information which the expert based his conclusions on.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

24 Q. Doctor, this was a decaying body which had undergone

25 putrifaction. We are now speaking of C34. Is that correct?

1 A. That's correct.

2 Q. Thank you. Could you please now look at another exhibit, P334

3 again, L1, C12.

4 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the usher please hand this to

5 the witness, the French text, that is.

6 Q. Doctor, it says here that the bullet was fired from relatively

7 close range, at a distance of about 2 metres -- less than 2 metres. Is

8 there any basis for this conclusion in the report?

9 A. I have not found any.

10 Q. Thank you. Doctor, now that we're talking about C12, the autopsy

11 report L1, C12, it says that the calibre of the weapon is 5.45-5.56. Do

12 you see here on what basis the calibre of the projectile was established?

13 A. I have found no indication of that in the expert report. I

14 believe that this is something inferred from the entry wound, but this is

15 something I assume.

16 Q. We have already agreed that the calibre cannot be estimated from

17 the entry wound scientifically; is that correct?

18 A. As far as I'm concerned, the answer is yes. I would certainly be

19 more cautious when choosing my words. I would have used the

20 word "consistent" and not been so 100 per cent sure. Once again, I was

21 not there and I did not take part in the post mortem examination.

22 Q. Thank you, Doctor. I'm aware of this and that's why I asked you

23 to clarify this.

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the doctor please be shown the

25 same exhibit, but this time page 4. It's autopsy, or rather, excuse me,

1 page 11, and the autopsy is L1, C3. I have the French version here.

2 Q. Doctor, in this autopsy report, no exit wound is mentioned on the

3 body; am I right?

4 A. Your Honour, yes, an exit wound is mentioned. On reading my

5 colleague's report, the larynx has a hole in it with 8 millimetres in the

6 thyroid cartilage on the left-hand side and came out of the cartilage;

7 presence of wounds in vessels and arteries of the neck. So an exit wound

8 is mentioned.

9 Q. Would I be correct -- oh, yes, yes, I see it's in the report but

10 not in the conclusion. However, would I be correct in saying that due to

11 putrifaction there may be tissue missing from the place where the exit

12 wound would be?

13 A. This is an assumption I'm making. The state of the neck is

14 mentioned; haemorrhage in the neck and this area is definitely putrified.

15 Q. Thank you, Doctor. Would I be correct in saying that there are

16 insufficient elements here on which to base a conclusion concerning the

17 calibre of the projectile?

18 A. I would say the same as I did previously. According to scientific

19 logic, it would be better to say consistent with such and such a calibre

20 rather than demonstrating something with certainty.

21 Q. Thank you, Doctor.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now see L1, C5. That's

23 page 19. I have the French here.

24 Q. Doctor, I will now show you two reports, also L1, C14. In both

25 these reports, we can see that on the basis of the general appearance or

1 on the basis of the entry wound, it says that 12-millimetre ammunition was

2 used. That's probably calibre 12.

3 My question is: Bearing in mind the impact of a 12-millimetre

4 calibre projectile and the fact that it's stated here that it was fired at

5 relatively short range, would I be correct in saying that there is a high

6 level of probability that this bullet would not remain lodged in the body

7 but would pass through the body, even if it hit a bone?

8 A. Once again, I did not attend the post mortem examination, so I can

9 only base my comments on the report I have read. The expert has clearly

10 noted that there was no identification of an exit wound. The

11 identification of the -- conducted by the expert is based on a fragment of

12 the projectile.

13 Q. Doctor, based on your experience, could we say that it's very

14 likely that a 12-millimetre calibre projectile would pass through the body

15 if fired at the range mentioned in this report?

16 A. Anything is possible. A 12-millimetre projectile can also not

17 come out the other side.

18 Q. Could you please now look at L1, C9. It's on page 33. Same

19 exhibit, P334.

20 Doctor, bearing in mind the description in the conclusions and

21 based on everything stated in this autopsy report, do you think it likely

22 or possible that two persons or one person fired projectiles at such short

23 range simultaneously?

24 A. As far as the circumstances in which this shot was fired is

25 concerned, anything's possible.

1 Q. Is there any basis on which one could establish in this autopsy at

2 what range the projectile was fired and what the calibre of the projectile

3 was?

4 A. I think that my colleague wanted to probably compare two different

5 wounds. The one where the entry wound was small in size, 18 millimetres

6 wide, and with the corresponding exit wound, this was conducted on the

7 skull and also on the neck. An entry wound which was much larger, it was

8 1.8 millimetres with no identifiable exit wound.

9 Once again, I interpreted the report because I was not present and

10 was not able to examine the body, but these were two quite different

11 findings.

12 Q. Thank you, Doctor. Doctor, based on the descriptions in these

13 autopsy reports, these particular ones relating to Gornja Sudimlja, could

14 one draw any conclusions about the time that the bodies had been in the

15 ground or could one establish that death occurred at approximately the

16 same time and in approximately the same location?

17 A. As a general rule, it's always extremely difficult to determine

18 the period in which a body was buried, because this depends on a series of

19 very variable factors related to the nature of the ground itself, whether

20 there are a lot of rocks in it, how much water there is in the soil; it

21 also depends on whether the bodies were clothed, shrouded, whether this

22 shroud was in plastic material. A lot of factors will influence the

23 putrifaction. We don't have any type of scientific formula that can

24 enable us to make a report between putrifaction and the duration that the

25 body spent in the ground.

1 In my colleague's report, you only see information about the

2 condition of the body, the state of the putrifaction, whether the body was

3 greatly putrified or not; therefore, I cannot make any conclusions about

4 the time spent by the body underground.

5 Q. So the answer is no, if I understand you correctly.

6 A. Yes -- no, it's no, considering the state of development of

7 science in that particular field, and because there were no additional and

8 more descriptive information available in this particular report.

9 Q. Thank you.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] L2, C22, page 81, please.

11 Q. Doctor, on the basis of the general appearance of the wounds, can

12 one establish the weapon that was used when firing and, if possible, can

13 one establish the criteria, and do these criteria exist in professional

14 literature? It has to do with the conclusion of L2, C22.

15 A. In your question, are you referring to the gun, to the type of

16 weapon, to whether it's an automatic weapon or how the weapon is fired?

17 Q. Well, this is the conclusion here. On the basis of the general

18 appearance, it is concluded that an automatic rifle, a Kalashnikov, was

19 used and fired at close range. So it's those two sentences that I'm

20 interested in. Is it possible to draw such a conclusion on the basis of

21 these findings?

22 A. If you don't have the weapon available, if you don't have the

23 ammunition available, I personally would not go out on a limb and give the

24 name of a particular weapon. But I would like to point out that in the

25 French version of the text, you have the term "Kalashnikov" in parenthesis

1 with a question mark after it, and therefore I assume that the expert here

2 considered this as a mere hypothesis.

3 Q. Also, am I right if I say that we do not have a basis to establish

4 the range from which the firing took place?

5 A. I think you have to make a clear distinction between the findings

6 of the autopsy and the information in the report that can lead to an

7 assessment of the report itself. These reports are very short, and the

8 only thing I can identify here, and that is related to the firing range,

9 is that in the subtitle "Thoracic Region" I see the mention of a shored

10 wound, a shored wound, and that could lead us to think that this was a

11 shot fired at close range. But once again I don't have the information

12 available to me to be categoric in that matter because I don't know, for

13 example, if any traces of powder were found on the clothes, for example.

14 Q. Actually, Doctor, am I right, now that you've mentioned this, if I

15 say -- well, this was one of my questions, that in this report -- just a

16 moment, please. Let me find this. Yes, yes. That in this report,

17 clothing was not described in terms of the damage done to the clothing by

18 projectiles. I'm not talking about this specific report, but in the

19 entire work of the French team, basically the autopsy reports did not

20 include descriptions of the damage done to the clothing.

21 A. As for L2, C22, yes, indeed, you don't have any observations or

22 findings regarding clothing except to say that there were three impacts on

23 the shirt of the victim and three impacts that seem very close to each

24 other, because they are located in a very close region. But there is

25 nothing about powder residuals or traces of smoke.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Where is the reference to "three impacts on the

2 shirt of the victim"?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] In the French version of L2, C22, at

4 paragraph -- the paragraph related to clothing, you can see that the body

5 is dressed in a red-striped, blue shirt with three impacts in the middle

6 third, lower third, and right paramedian.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

8 That would rather suggest, Mr. Visnjic, that your general question

9 would be answered by --

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Yes.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: -- a statement that these autopsy reports do, on

12 occasion, include reference to the clothing.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Correct, Your Honour. On occasion

14 there are references to clothing; that is what I asked the witness. But

15 what does not exist in these reports is -- well, let me actually ask the

16 witness. Let me refer to two or three examples and then let's draw a

17 conclusion.

18 L2, C63, page 57.

19 Q. If there is a tiny particle of metal in the skin and the

20 projectile remained intact while passing through the body, does that mean

21 that the projectile went through a metal obstacle beforehand?

22 MR. VISNJIC: I'm sorry, I don't think I have the right page.

23 [Interpretation] Yes, P332, page 71 in the original.

24 Your Honour, I see that it is the time for the break now.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, but you've asked a question about whether a

1 tiny particle of the metal and the projectile remained intact, that it

2 must have passed through a metal obstacle. And Dr. Baccard hopefully is

3 going to cast light on that.

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, on my screen I see

5 photographs that are quite difficult to make out, but I don't see anything

6 related to what Mr. Visnjic has just said.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, it is P332. It's a

8 different exhibit. P332, page 71 of the original. The page in the

9 translation is 57.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Is this the correct one?

11 MR. VISNJIC: No, it's [Interpretation] L2, C63.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: Let's resume with this after the lunch break.

13 You'll see it again after the lunch break, Dr. Baccard. Can I

14 invite you again to leave the courtroom with the usher, and we'll resume

15 in about an hour's time.

16 [The witness stands down]

17 JUDGE BONOMY: We'll resume at quarter to 2.00.

18 --- Luncheon recess taken at 12.46 p.m.

19 --- On resuming at 1.45 p.m.

20 [The witness takes the stand]

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

22 MR. VISNJIC: Yes, Your Honour. Thank you.

23 Q. [Interpretation] Doctor, we have made progress in technical

24 terms. Now, what we have in front of us is indeed the autopsy report L2,

25 C63, from P332. My question was: If there is a particle of metal in the

1 skin of the entry wound and the projectile went -- and the projectile,

2 after passing through the body, remained intact, does that mean that the

3 projectile had previously gone through a metal barrier on its way?

4 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could you please adjust the French

5 version a bit so the doctor can see the conclusion. Thank you.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. It's for the conclusions of my

7 colleague here, it is stated that the -- this metal part was located in a

8 perforation underlying the skin, so that's the first explanation. What he

9 means, maybe that it's something that is embedded deeper. Two options can

10 be envisaged; either the projectile was fragmented once it passed through

11 the metal barrier or the fragmentation took place beforehand. But since

12 we do not have any photographs or any sketches, I can't say more. We

13 would need to find the previous pages and the other material underlying

14 this report.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: I'm sorry, I'm not understanding this.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Could we see the entirety of the

17 report. Could we also see the sketch of the body that we find with all of

18 these reports. Normally, it should be on the next page.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] That's the next page in the French

20 version.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] On the sketch we see a piece of

22 metal that is located beneath the entry wound on the left-hand side of the

23 chest here, next to the axilla. It's difficult for me to answer this

24 question without having the analysis of this piece of metal. Does it come

25 from the projectile itself or is it a different kind of piece of metal.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

2 Q. On the basis of all this, can a conclusion be made or can it be --

3 can the range from which the projectile was fired be determined?

4 A. Could I have the report, the hard copy of the report, because I'm

5 only shown this on the screen page by page and therefore it's quite

6 difficult for me to answer your questions on the basis of what I see on

7 the screen.

8 Yes, I believe that the conclusions of my colleagues about a

9 short-range fire are linked to the fact that there is an undermining, a

10 level undermined in the left-hand side of the rib-cage.

11 Q. Is that enough for a scientific conclusion to be drawn on the

12 basis of that?

13 A. Obviously, you could expect more data, more information, in the

14 report, but once again I was only asked to review the report and this is

15 not an examination of the body itself that I conducted. And my personal

16 interpretation has to be limited, of course, because of that fact.

17 Q. Thank you, Doctor.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And in fact, I have two copies in

19 French and I would ask the usher to hand two copies to the doctor to make

20 things go faster. Again, it's the same exhibit.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Let me add something. When I say

22 that it's difficult to render a conclusion without having available the

23 analysis of the shrapnel, it is because this person had several clothes,

24 items of clothing, including a jacket, and in the report I see nothing

25 about this shrapnel or this piece of metal. Was it something coming from

1 the clothing itself or is it a fragment that came from the projectile

2 itself? I have no way of saying that.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

4 Q. Thank you. Doctor, you see in front of you L2, C68. That's on

5 page 91 in the French version; page 72 of the B/C/S version. And L2, C87,

6 which can be found on page 165 of the French version, and I have the

7 following question for you:

8 What were the parameters that were used for the claim to be made

9 that an impacted bone fracture in the region of the head was caused by a

10 blow with a rifle-butt? And could this injury have been caused by a fall

11 and the subsequent impact against a hard floor surface or any other hard

12 objects that were to be found on the floor or perhaps some structure or

13 something of that kind?

14 A. I believe that the reason why my colleague said that death was

15 caused by a blunt instrument, a rifle-butt, this conclusion was derived

16 from the shape -- the size of the wound. When I was in Kosovo, I

17 witnessed wounds that were typical of a wound inflicted by a rifle-butt,

18 and you could see the shape on the -- of the rifle-butt on the -- the

19 screws of the rifle-butt on the wound.

20 Q. Can this be seen on these photographs, Doctor? I'm talking about

21 L2, C68 and L2, C87.

22 A. The pictures I have here are photocopies in black and white, and

23 because of the poor quality of these photographs I can't make any

24 scientific interpretation.

25 Q. Thank you.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

2 L2, C50; that's page 19 of the same exhibit. That's the French version,

3 page 19, or page 15 of the B/C/S version.

4 Q. Doctor, let me ask you the following question: The injuries in

5 the region of the back, could they have been caused in combat while the

6 victim was surrounded by the enemy forces?

7 A. You can't make any interpretation regarding the circumstances in

8 which these injuries were inflicted; at least I can't do it, considering

9 the information that is available to me. It is stated here that it is a

10 shot fired at a short distance and that the entry wounds are located in

11 the back. Then everyone is free to make the interpretation he wishes to

12 make.

13 Q. Again, do we have enough elements to claim that the bullets were

14 fired at close range and to make any claims as to the calibre of the

15 bullets?

16 A. Here we are in the same situation as previously, because if you

17 look at this report, you have nothing here that can enable you to know on

18 what basis, on what criterion, the expert relied to say that this was a

19 short-range firing. It doesn't mean that this information was

20 available -- was not available at the time of the autopsy, and the same

21 thing about the calibre of the weapon.

22 Q. But we have no evidence of that in the reports that you are now

23 interpreting for us.

24 A. No, there is nothing here that can confirm or contradict what was

25 stated here by my colleague, but my colleague is probably qualified enough

1 to render these conclusions in all responsibility.

2 Q. Doctor, in Exhibit P206, on page 10, your colleagues used the

3 information to the effect that according to the witness statement the

4 Serbian check-point was at about 1.7 kilometres from the cemetery, which

5 extends at 300 metres towards Vucitrn and Gornja Sudimlja, and that this

6 was an execution site. But when the OTP investigators did an on-site

7 investigation of this purported execution site, they were able to find

8 only five 7.62 cartridges and 9-millimetre cartridges. Would that point

9 to the conclusion that the persons whose bodies were found at the Gornja

10 Sudimlja cemetery had actually been killed elsewhere?

11 A. In no way can I answer your question. I have nothing available to

12 me that enables me to answer your question. There is nothing within my

13 area of expertise about this in the report.

14 Q. Thank you. One more thing, Doctor. In your report, you relayed

15 the conclusion reached by the forensic pathologist from the team that did

16 the expert analysis in Gornja Sudimlja, and there is a sentence there that

17 says: "In accordance with the opinion of the forensic pathologist,

18 victims were mostly shot at close range."

19 Now, my question to you is as follows: Am I right if I say that,

20 bearing in mind the condition of the bodies - we said that they were

21 decomposing - and the information we get in the autopsy reports, that it

22 is difficult to make a scientifically sound conclusion that victims were

23 mostly -- had mostly been shot at close range.

24 A. No, because once again there is a difference between the

25 interpretation made of the report and the conclusions of the post mortem

1 examinations themselves. In my conclusion in my report about this

2 particular site, I said that it was generally estimated that these shots

3 had been fired at short range, and I said that this was the opinion of my

4 colleagues. It's not something I stated myself, because I found nothing

5 in the documents that would allow me to confirm or to contradict these

6 findings. I don't mean to say that these findings are not accurate, but

7 they fall within the responsibility of my colleagues. But I had no data,

8 no additional information, allowing me to say whether these findings were

9 accurate or not.

10 Q. Am I right, then, Doctor, if I say that on the basis of those

11 findings it is impossible to actually state or confirm that these people

12 had indeed been shot at close range?

13 A. This is not part of the material and information I studied in my

14 report. If you look at my report, you see that it's divided into two

15 parts. In one part you have a statistical study of groups of victims

16 regarding their gender, their age, their clothing, civilian clothing or

17 not; and then you have forensic information, the type of wounds inflicted

18 to the victims, the location of the wounds, the cause of death, and the

19 weapon used to kill these people.

20 When I stated that shots had been fired at short or very short

21 range, I very clearly stated in my report that these were the findings and

22 the conclusions of my colleagues and not mine.

23 Q. Thank you. And as regards the weapons from which those people had

24 been killed, am I right when I say that it is definitely impossible to

25 determine the calibre of the weapon -- weapons, bearing in mind the

1 methodology and the techniques used by those experts?

2 A. As a general rule, you can draw general conclusions of the

3 findings of the autopsy reports. For example, when you look at the

4 diameter of the entry wound or the amount of anatomical damage, then you

5 can have an idea about the range of calibre, if it's a very high-velocity

6 projectile, for example. But if you want to determine the exact calibre

7 of the weapon, you have to work and analyse a projectile that's been

8 extracted from the body and that is then analysed by an expert who will

9 analyze the projectile. And later on, if you find other projectiles or

10 the weapon itself, then you can make comparative shots and establish with

11 a degree of certainty that you're talking about this particular weapon.

12 Q. And, in fact, this is part -- this is not your area of expertise;

13 this is something that ballistics experts deal with. Am I right?

14 A. If you're talking about the examination of weapons or ammunition,

15 that's the area of expertise of experts in weapons and ammunition.

16 Ballistics, that's something different. It's the science that studies the

17 movement of a projectile in the air; that's something different yet again.

18 Q. Thank you. Doctor, let us move on to the Bela Crkva site and I

19 will have just a few brief questions related to this site.

20 Is it correct that the autopsy reports for this site do not

21 contain any information on the direction from which the projectile entered

22 the body, the range, and the bullet track through the body; that the

23 person who did the autopsy did not enter this information?

24 A. With respect to this site, we have information about gun-shot

25 wounds. We have some data about the number of projectiles found and about

1 the location of the entry wounds.

2 If I may, I would like to add that since there was no autopsy -

3 because here we had an external examination and an X-ray examination -

4 these were the only conclusions that could validly be made considering the

5 circumstances for this particular site.

6 Q. And on the basis of the description of the wounds in the autopsy

7 protocols for the Bela Crkva site, is it possible to determine the

8 relative positions of the assailant and the victim, the distance from

9 which the projectiles were fired at the victims, or whether the victims

10 had been executed or, indeed, any other information?

11 A. I have outlined the data available. The majority of the entry

12 wounds were located to the front side of the trunk. I do not remember,

13 but to answer I would need to refer to the autopsy report itself, I do not

14 remember if the firing range was mentioned, the firing distance was

15 mentioned. But I believe that this -- these are the only data that are

16 mentioned in this report and that are in relation to the question you've

17 just asked.

18 Q. Thank you. The next site is Kotlina. That's Exhibit P361.

19 Can it be said with any certainty what kind of mines or

20 explosives, in other words, bombs, shells, grenades, rockets, or some

21 other kinds of devices, were used to cause the wounds that are described

22 here?

23 A. In the report drafted by my colleagues, I found no information

24 concerning the kind of explosives that had been used. This could be

25 determined on the basis of fragments or shrapnel fragments that would have

1 been extracted from the bodies of the victims.

2 Q. And in the well or around it, were any parts of those explosive

3 devices found?

4 A. I don't recollect having seen anything of that kind. That said, I

5 focused on my specialty --

6 THE INTERPRETER: We didn't hear the end of the witness's

7 sentence; interpreter's note.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I focused on forensic matters.

9 Let me repeat. I was saying that I focused primarily on my

10 specialty, i.e., forensic medicine.

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

12 Q. Thank you. The wounds caused by those explosives --

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And could I have page 10 shown to

14 the witness. That would be body number 1.

15 Q. So wounds caused by the explosives on this body, were they ante

16 mortem or post mortem?

17 A. Could we possibly scroll down and move to page 2, please. Next

18 page, please.

19 I believe that the ante mortem characteristic of the wound was

20 discovered by my colleague because I can see that he has conversely

21 established a distinction between bullet wounds that were post mortem

22 wounds, given that there were no lethal signs of haemorrhage.

23 Attention to the interpreters: This has to do with vital signs of

24 haemorrhage and not lethal.

25 Q. If I understood your answer correctly - I've been trying to

1 follow - your answer is that the wounds were inflicted during the victim's

2 lifetime; is that right?

3 A. I think that the findings provided by my colleague do say this.

4 He did conversely compare this with a wound on the left hip. The gun-shot

5 wounds were mentioned, and it was stated that these were most probably

6 post mortem because there was no corresponding bruise. So he did check

7 whether this was ante or post mortem.

8 Q. The firing traces on the body, are they due to explosive devices

9 or was the origin different?

10 A. I have no information which would enable me to answer this

11 question, no information contained in the report.

12 Q. If I understood you correctly, in response to my previous

13 question, you said that the bullet wounds were probably inflicted post

14 mortem and that is what the report says. However, do we have an answer to

15 the question as to whether the wounds from explosives were inflicted

16 during the victim's lifetime?

17 A. This cannot be stated positively, but it is mentioned negatively

18 when other wounds are being discussed, which makes me believe that this is

19 a point of course which has been checked by my colleague, as it is

20 something which has been addressed every time such an examination has been

21 conducted.

22 Q. Thank you.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Page 14. Could the witness please

24 be shown page 14, body number 5.

25 Q. The absence of wounds on the bodies, does it mean that the victims

1 were killed elsewhere in comparison with persons that had exit/entry

2 wounds on their bodies -- explosive and bullet wounds?

3 A. I have not interpreted the short autopsy report that's on the

4 screen. I don't think this would indicate that there is a lack of wounds;

5 it's just stated that there are no marks of explosive or of fire shots and

6 that they -- these indications were found around the stomach area. This

7 indicates that there was a wound in this part of the body.

8 MR. STAMP: Just for clarification, the witness was shown just the

9 last part of that autopsy. I think the preceding page of the autopsy

10 would indicate that only a part of the body was found, so perhaps he could

11 be shown that for completion.

12 MR. VISNJIC: Yes. I agree.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. There are many more lesions

14 than what is mentioned on the next page. This is what we could, normally

15 speaking, call body parts. This is a torso with a head and two arms, if I

16 remember correctly. And in addition, there was a loss of tissue on the

17 left arm, in the forearm and at the elbow level. This would coincide with

18 clear wounds.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

20 Q. My question was whether the absence of gun-shot wounds means that

21 these persons were killed in a different place in comparison with persons

22 on whose bodies wounds were found that were due to explosives and

23 gun-shots.

24 A. It is impossible to answer that question.

25 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Please correct the previous

1 answer provided by the witness. There were traces and marks -- there were

2 marks of explosive and fire.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the next page please be shown,

4 page 11, body number 2. Page 11 of the translation, body number 2.

5 Q. Were the wounds inflicted while the witness was still alive or

6 post mortem, inflicted by side-arms?

7 A. Is it small pieces of decomposed flesh and remnants of bone? Is

8 this mentioned here?

9 Q. Body number 2. It is a victim. And the question was whether the

10 projectile wounds were inflicted by a hand-held weapon or side-arm while

11 the witness was still alive or post mortem -- victim.

12 THE INTERPRETER: Victim. The interpreter misspoke, I'm sorry.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] This is not what I have on my

14 screen, which is -- what I have just said is what I have on the screen.

15 This would be the previous page.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could pages 10 and 11 please be

17 shown.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: I thought you were asking about body number 2.

19 MR. VISNJIC: Yes, Your Honour, it's a mistake. I think it's 9

20 and 10.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Is body number 2, is that the body

22 of Kuqi Minah, Mr. or Mrs.? No, it's not. Another name.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Previous translation continues]...

24 JUDGE BONOMY: The question is whether the projectile wounds were

25 inflicted by a hand-held weapon or side-arm while the witness was still

1 alive or whether it was done post mortem.

2 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: The interpreter misspoke.

3 It wasn't a witness, it was a victim.

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] On my screen I can see body number

5 1, Kuqi Minah. I don't have body number 2 on my screen --

6 JUDGE BONOMY: It's body 2 that we're dealing with here.

7 [Trial Chamber and registrar confer]

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, the problem is that the

9 report first gives body number 2 and then body number 1 for reasons

10 unknown just to create confusion.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: We had body 2 on the screen and it disappeared.

12 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The pages are 9 --

13 JUDGE BONOMY: There we are. Yes. Thank you.

14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Can we scroll down, please.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, can you --

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Could I be shown the rest of this

17 page, please. Thank you. The autopsy. The next page, please.

18 What was your question?

19 JUDGE BONOMY: The question was whether the projectile wounds were

20 inflicted post mortem or ante mortem.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Can we go back to the previous

22 page. Could I have a hard copy of this, please, or could I just scroll up

23 and down the screen --

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] I can give it to the witness, but I

25 will withdraw the question. I see that I'm a bit confused myself with

1 regard to that question, so I'll simply withdraw the question and I'll

2 move on.

3 JUDGE CHOWHAN: Well, I would have a question just for my own

4 understanding. I think things can be simplified by an explanation coming

5 from an expert like your good self as to what would be the characteristics

6 with the two positions, post mortem and ante mortem, because of the

7 fire-arm injuries. They are different, and it will have different

8 results. So once you please tell us that, then it's very easy even for a

9 layman to find out if this is a wound caused after death or before death.

10 This would help us all in understanding it. And they would certainly be

11 different because the body position gets different. It has its rigor

12 mortis. It has its different positions after death, and before death,

13 when it's warm, it has a different position. Thank you.

14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, you're quite right, Your

15 Honour. To ascertain whether a wound is ante mortem or post mortem, the

16 expert relies on simple signs, traces of a haemorrhage around the wound,

17 if there's a peripheral haemorrhage, whether it's ante mortem or peri

18 mortem. If the wound has not bled, then it's post mortem; that means that

19 the person was already dead when he or she sustained the injury. That is

20 the main distinction you can draw between ante and post mortem wounds.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

22 Q. Thank you. On pages -- let's try to deal with it this way, in

23 order to speed things up. Pages 16, 27, and 30 are the relevant pages.

24 The bodies are 7, 14, and 16. It is stated that the skulls of these

25 bodies had been smashed by a blunt object. My question is whether this

1 kind of injury could have been sustained when the victim fell on the

2 ground, on a hard surface, or was hit by a tree or a part of a tree once

3 the body had been thrown after an explosion.

4 A. I need to refer to each report individually. I cannot provide you

5 with a general answer. If I could have this displayed on the screen,

6 please.

7 MR. VISNJIC: I have the hard copy pages, and I can show the

8 witness.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, please hand over the hard copies, and it will

10 speed things up hopefully.

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, this is a

12 Serbo-Croatian version.

13 MR. VISNJIC: Sorry. I only have -- I have only Serbo-Croatian,

14 so we should exercise it through e-court. So page --

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, I'm afraid you're going to have to look at

16 these -- now, are they -- it's body 7. We have body 7. Now let's scroll

17 up and see the whole of that report, and then we'll move to number 14 and

18 number 16, wherever they are. Can we move this?

19 MR. VISNJIC: Yes.

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Next page. As far as this body is

21 concerned, there is no information that would enable me to answer the

22 question put to me by Mr. Visnjic.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, can we --

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Next body, please.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: -- go to number 14, please.

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Given that there are traces of

2 explosion and fire, but as far as this specific question is concerned,

3 namely, whether there was any pressure exerted by a sharp instrument,

4 there is nothing there.

5 THE INTERPRETER: Correction: Blunt instrument.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Let's move this one, because we're at the clothing

7 and so on. Let's get to the bit that matters. There we are. And then on

8 to the next page, please.

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As far as the question is concerned

10 relating to the blunt instrument and the fracture of the skull, it is not

11 described in such a way that would enable us to define what kind of blunt

12 instrument was used. And I can see that my colleague was unable to assess

13 whether this was ante mortem. There were traces of explosion and fire,

14 nonetheless, as well as traces of a gun-shot wound on the left-hand

15 shoulder.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Now number 16, please. Back one -- oh, yes, sorry,

17 it's there.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Next page. This has to do with body

19 17. Here again, the expert was unable to ascertain whether this was ante

20 or post mortem as far as the wound on the skull was concerned, but he did

21 state that this body part -- these were body remains and body remains were

22 incomplete. And there were traces of explosion and fire on the body.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you. Page 32, please.

24 Your Honours, I'm slowly bringing this part to an end.

25 Page 32 of the translation, body number 19.

1 Q. My question is why the weapon was not established, the weapon or

2 whatever caused the wounds in the abdominal area.

3 A. Is this the body of Loku Naser?

4 Q. Yes.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: That's not right, is it, Mr. Visnjic? I thought it

6 was number 19.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] No, 19 -- yes --

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Loku Naser is 20.

9 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour, but this is F --

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Oh, I see, I'm sorry.

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Projectile fragments were sampled,

12 and this was done on the spine.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

14 Q. Correct. But the weapon or instrument that caused the wound?

15 A. I don't have the findings of this examination. I can provide you

16 with a general answer without referring specifically to this case. If you

17 provide me with a finding for this case, I can give you my personal

18 interpretation. As a general rule, you cannot identify a weapon on the

19 basis of the projectile, because it depends what state the projectile is

20 in either because there is not enough of it or because it is extremely

21 degraded or deteriorated and therefore you cannot identify it properly.

22 But I can try to answer in greater detail if you provide me with

23 the findings of the ammunition and weapons expert in this particular case.

24 JUDGE CHOWHAN: Do you think another difficulty is because this

25 hit the abdominal portion which is a soft portion and sometimes the

1 injury -- the injury can vary, because if it hits the bone then you can

2 find out a bit. But if it hits a softer portion, then I think there's a

3 difficulty finding out the weapon used.

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As far as projectiles or projectile

5 fragments which have been recovered, I referred to what is called

6 projectile fragment number 17 which was recovered in the lumbar spine.

7 This was something which was found in that particular spot at the level of

8 bone which had probably been embedded. Then there is a risk of the

9 projectile deteriorating because of the shock sustained against a hard

10 surface. If the projectile had been recovered in the soft tissue, then

11 undoubtedly it would have been much better preserved. The shock would

12 have been absorbed.

13 MR. VISNJIC: Thank you.

14 [Interpretation] Page 33, body number 20.

15 Q. The wound on the left side of the neck, could it have been

16 inflicted by an explosive?

17 A. I don't have the photographs with me and the description in the

18 expert report is fairly concise. We only have the location here and the

19 factor that the wound was connected to a sharp instrument. I believe that

20 this diagnosis was made on the basis of standard characteristics related

21 to the edges of the wound. Sharp instruments usually leave very clear --

22 clear-cut wounds, whereas an explosion or a wound caused by shrapnel, the

23 edges are serrated.

24 Q. But you do not rule out this possibility that I have just outlined

25 to you.

1 A. I tend to trust the expert who is quite capable of establishing a

2 distinction between a wound caused by a sharp instrument and a wound

3 caused by shrapnel or an explosion. I have no reason to question what he

4 says.

5 Q. Thank you.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And the last page from this exhibit

7 is page 41, but could we also show the witness page 40. That's body

8 number 25.

9 Q. The question is whether the gun-shot wound to the right calf could

10 have been caused in combat and whether cause of death was actually

11 exsanguination caused by inadequate application of dressing.

12 A. These are two facts that have been addressed separately in the

13 report where it is stated firstly that the bandage of this wound was

14 make-shift and not professional; and secondly, that the cause of death had

15 to do with an external -- with external haemorrhage. I have no -- nothing

16 which would enable me to criticise, deny, or confirm the findings of this

17 forensic pathologist.

18 Q. Thank you. Doctor, let me now ask you some questions regarding

19 the Izbica site and your statement where you talk about the forensic

20 on-site investigation on the basis of a videotape. On page 5254 of the

21 Milosevic transcript, you stated that this method has its limitations, and

22 then you said that:

23 "As far as we are concerned, it is out of the question for us to

24 call this an expert methodology. This is just a source of information in

25 forensic medicine, just a source of information that we use when we have

1 no access to the actual body. Then we have to use the information that we

2 have at our disposal."

3 Do you still maintain what you said at page 5254 of the Milosevic

4 transcript?

5 A. Yes, I do, Mr. Visnjic. This is a review of photographic

6 documents shot by an expert, but in no way can this be compared with an

7 expert report. This has to do with the value of the information

8 provided. On the one hand, the experts and pathologist will work on a

9 three-dimensional body, will be able to conduct an autopsy, dissection,

10 will be able to touch the body, will be able to use a number of items at

11 his disposal, like X-rays; on the other hand, we work on the basis of

12 videographic and photographic documents which have been taken by

13 non-professional photographers, with its limitations, of course.

14 Q. Thank you, Dr. Baccard. Just a few questions related to the Cirez

15 site. On the basis of the autopsy reports alone, is it possible to

16 determine that drowning was the cause of death in bodies that had spent

17 more than two months under water; and if yes, could you please tell me.

18 A. Is this a question of a general nature or does this have to do

19 with this particular report? The fact that you have on the autopsy table

20 a body that has spent several days -- several hours, several days, or

21 several months in water does add to the difficulty. Nonetheless, you can

22 still determine the cause of death and the circumstances of death.

23 Q. In this specific case - now we're talking about this report that

24 you have in front of you - was the autopsy the only means to determine

25 that drowning was the cause of death or was this conclusion based on some

1 other data; and if so, what data?

2 A. As far as the information contained in the autopsy report is

3 concerned, there is nothing there that would enable me to answer your

4 question. It is mentioned in the reports of my colleagues that the

5 diagnosis -- it was diagnosed as an ante mortem -- as ante mortem

6 drowning. I have no details on the way in which they made their

7 observations and how they reached these conclusions.

8 Q. So if I were to offer you another explanation, that they did not,

9 in fact, drown or that the cause of death was not drowning, could you then

10 give me your answer to that; that you don't have enough elements, in other

11 words?

12 A. What I said was based on the findings of my colleagues, and I have

13 no information which would enable me to doubt what they've said.

14 Q. Thank you. Doctor, just one more question. After two months

15 under water, can any difference be made between the fluid caused by

16 decomposition and blood in such a body that has spent two months under

17 water; and if yes, how?

18 A. It all depends on where the blood is located. This can look very

19 different. Putrifaction fluids can look very different. It depends

20 whether the blood has been protected or preserved in the cavities and

21 protected from putrifaction.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I have no further

23 questions for this witness.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Visnjic.

25 Mr. Ackerman.

1 MR. ACKERMAN: No questions, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Bakrac.

3 MR. BAKRAC: [Interpretation] No questions, Your Honour.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ivetic.

5 MR. IVETIC: Yes, I do, Your Honour.

6 Cross-examination by Mr. Ivetic:

7 Q. Good afternoon, Dr. Baccard. My name is Dan Ivetic, and as an

8 attorney for Sreten Lukic, I just have certain questions to clarify and

9 highlight portions of your testimony. I'll try and be brief so we can try

10 and conclude within the time-period that we have.

11 First of all, I have to go through some background questions that

12 were touched upon earlier today. Sir, while working for the Office of the

13 Prosecutor of this Tribunal, did you have an office or workspace within

14 the confines of the Prosecutor's premises here in the Tribunal?

15 A. I had several offices. I worked with several investigating teams,

16 so I did change offices in this building. I was working in these rooms

17 together with these teams, but I did have an office which was made

18 available to me. So the answer is yes.

19 Q. Thank you. And at that time did you receive a salary or regular

20 consultancy fee from the Office of the Prosecutor related to your work for

21 them during this time-period?

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ivetic, have you intimated a challenge to

23 the -- in the specific sense, a challenge to the integrity of the witness

24 based on his engagement by the Office of the Prosecutor?

25 MR. IVETIC: I have not, no.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Do you think this is a reasonable approach to take

2 to this witness?

3 MR. IVETIC: At this point I don't intend to challenge --

4 JUDGE BONOMY: So what is the significance of finding out how he

5 was paid?

6 MR. IVETIC: Whether he was paid and --

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Indeed, whether he -- what is the significance of

8 that? Unless it affects his integrity in some way.

9 MR. IVETIC: It goes towards the credibility of the witness in

10 terms of not necessarily overall his conclusions but in terms of matters

11 that are set forth. It goes to an evaluation of credibility. It's one of

12 the factors that needs to be considered, I believe, with respect to any

13 expert witness.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: There is a cultural difference here which I've got

15 to be conscious of in the approach to experts in our respective domestic

16 jurisdictions. We tend to accept them at face value unless there's

17 something strikingly significant that might affect the general integrity

18 as experts, whereas you, I think, come from a jurisdiction where they're

19 much more likely to be challenged on that sort of basis.

20 MR. IVETIC: I think Your Honour is noticing in my jurisdiction a

21 lot of things are hotly challenged.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Indeed, and I'm just assessing whether it's right

23 and fair in the context of this jurisdiction and this case to be going

24 down that road.

25 MR. IVETIC: I understand. If it helps any, that was the last

1 question in that particular line of questioning, so --

2 JUDGE BONOMY: It usually tends to be when I interrupt.

3 MR. IVETIC: You have good timing, Your Honour.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: I don't think I can prevent you asking the

5 question, so please carry on.

6 MR. IVETIC: Thank you.

7 Q. Dr. Baccard, are you able to answer my question, or do you need me

8 to repeat it?

9 A. No, no, there's nothing confidential about the details I'm about

10 to give you. I have never been a staff member. I've never had a

11 fixed-term contract. I've never been a staff member working for the OTP.

12 I was always paid a consultancy fee as part of my contract. My longest

13 contract was in 2002, from February to October, and for the remainder I

14 worked on short-term contracts. These contracts could vary from one week

15 to two months to three months. And between contracts, I went back to

16 France and I worked as an expert for the cour de cassation, the highest

17 court of appeal in France, and I am still on the list of experts in

18 France.

19 Q. Thank you, sir. Now I'd like to turn to the site at Izbica that

20 you've already started to discuss somewhat with my colleague.

21 First, I'd like to clear something up. You were talking with my

22 colleague Mr. Visnjic about the videotape and the review of the videotape,

23 and I think there's something that needs to be clarified either in context

24 or in translation. The way I'm going to try to do that is to ask you --

25 to propose this to you:

1 Am I correct that the videotape and the photographs that you

2 actually reviewed of the bodies from Izbica, that this visual material did

3 not appear to have been taken by anyone with the appropriate forensic

4 medical training to preserve all necessary views of the bodies so that

5 conclusions could be made in the best manner possible?

6 A. I cannot answer that question so far, as I do not or did not have

7 these details. What I was told was that the person who had taken these

8 shots was a doctor called Liri Loshi. The documents that were provided to

9 me are mentioned in my report, V001733 until 2398. I don't know what

10 background this doctor had. All I do know is that the shots and the

11 angles at which the pictures were taken did not meet standard photographic

12 or forensic requirements. It was more a report than pictures taken for

13 scientific purposes. This is why the findings were rather limited as far

14 as these documents were concerned.

15 Q. Okay, Doctor. I thank you. I think we've gotten to the same --

16 the same end point for that, so I can move on now.

17 Now, with respect to that videotape, you testified in the

18 Milosevic case at transcript page 5253, lines 14 through 18, that based

19 merely on your review of the videotape, you could not conclude to a degree

20 of medical or forensic certainty that the bodies depicted in the video

21 were filmed at the site, as the precise place of execution, could you?

22 A. Your Honour, I think there is a difference between what I see on

23 the screen and the French translation I get in my headset. According to

24 the English text, it says that I could not conclude with a degree of

25 medical certainty or forensic certainty that the bodies in the video had

1 been filmed on the site where the execution took place. Is that right?

2 Q. Yes.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, it's -- yes. Carry on.

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The answer is yes. I was not

5 provided with the information which would enable me to answer this.

6 MR. IVETIC: Thank you.

7 Q. And in fact, Doctor, your review of the video material you did

8 have, albeit subject to the limitations that you've talked about already,

9 your review of the videotape did show some indications on some of the

10 bodies suggesting that they had been moved specifically post mortem prior

11 to being videotaped. Is that accurate?

12 A. In some cases the answer is yes, because on some of the bodies you

13 could notice lividity, areas of the body where the blood had concentrated,

14 which was different to the position in which the bodies were when they

15 were filmed. Sometimes the lividity was on the anterior part of the face,

16 whereas the bodies were found lying on the back, which was not consistent

17 with the position of lividity. And sometimes there were ischaemic with

18 whitish patches which indicated that the body had been lying on a hard

19 surface. Thirdly, there was also on some of the pictures vegetable

20 residues or small gravel or small stones which had been embedded in the

21 skin, which led me to believe that in certain cases the bodies had been

22 turned over so that one could see them better or see their faces better.

23 Q. Thank you, Doctor. You've covered most of the categories. I have

24 two more that I wanted to highlight specifically that you do discuss in

25 your report. That's Exhibit P1809. Specifically, in appendix number 5,

1 at page 115 out of 154 in the English. I apologise, I'm not sure if the

2 French is coincided with the page numbers, so I will -- for your sake, I

3 will read out the English and hopefully the translation will get to you

4 and we'll be able to be on the same page. But at this page of your

5 exhibit, your report states in the English: "The face of this old male

6 victim presents a bruise of the right check and linear and parallel

7 dermabrasions suggesting that the face has been pooled on the ground."

8 Would you agree with the proposition that we cannot, within a

9 reasonable degree of medical forensic certainty, exclude the possibility

10 that this body was moved from an altogether different location to the site

11 where it was filmed?

12 A. Could you give me the reference number of the photograph, please,

13 which this photograph refers to.

14 Q. Yes, Doctor. It's listed as photo ID number 03.09. I believe

15 it's on the screen, but, again, in the English only.

16 A. Yes. I would like to mention that this is dermabrasion on a

17 limited surface. The dermabrasion is -- transfers according to the

18 position of the head of the victim which is located on the right-hand

19 cheek. If the body has been moved, this is consistent with a rather short

20 distance. The body would have not been moved over a long distance. And

21 to be more comprehensive, the body might -- can be moved only a few

22 centimetres for it to look like that, once the skin of the victim

23 scratches against the surface of the ground.

24 Q. Okay. Thank you, Doctor. And I have one more, which comes at --

25 again, it's page 100 of the English version. It's photo ID number 01.24A

1 of the report, and again I'll read the description that's there:

2 "Here also the direction of the flow (upwards and slightly

3 forwards) as well as the location of post mortem lividity (front side of

4 the face with a zone of pressure on the left mandible) indicate a position

5 of the body different from that being reproduced on the photograph, as

6 well as a mobilisation after the fixing time of lividity (around 30 hours

7 after the death)."

8 Now, if you could explain this for a layperson such as myself,

9 does this mean that the body was moved by somebody over 30 hours after

10 death prior to being photographed?

11 A. Lividities do not move after 30 hours. I explained what lividity

12 is. It's abnormal colouring of the skin because the blood has remained

13 where it is, and after 30 hours these lividities will not be moving

14 around. You can find this just because one has turned the body over.

15 Movement or transportation of a body is not necessary. Over several

16 metres, it's enough to turn over the body of someone who was -- whose face

17 was facing the ground and then you get that particular result on the skin.

18 Q. But you cannot, based upon the forensic evidence, exclude

19 positively any other possibilities of movement over a longer distance, can

20 you?

21 A. Yes, and certainly not on the basis of the type of information

22 that was available to me, i.e., still photographs taken from a video that

23 itself had been made by someone who was not a professional.

24 Q. Thank you, sir. Now I would like to move to another aspect of the

25 report wherein you describe the findings of the French forensic team at

1 the burial location at Izbica. The inhumation site is recorded as

2 including 139 graves, but am I correct that there was forensic evidence

3 confirming only that 127 of these grave mounds had actually contained

4 human remains at one point in time?

5 Before you answer that, Doctor, just so we're clear -- oh, it's

6 been fixed in the transcript. We're talking inhumation, not exhumation at

7 this point.

8 A. This was information provided by the report of the French team.

9 In other words, these 139 graves were located at the site that was

10 described, but I do not have any more information. The minimum number of

11 victims was 127. This is information that you can read in the report of

12 Professor Lecomte and Professor Vorhauer. This information is derived

13 from testimonies and other analysis conducted, but I don't have anything

14 more. I don't have any other information about this particular site.

15 Q. Let me ask you, based upon your review of your colleagues' work

16 and the forensic material and evidence that they had at their disposal,

17 based upon that forensic evidence and material at the scene at Izbica, am

18 I correct that we cannot exclude the possibility that some of the grave

19 mounds were actually secondary burial sites as opposed to primary burial

20 sites?

21 A. There's no information in the report that would enable me to

22 answer that question.

23 Q. Fair enough, Doctor. Now, the French team at Izbica also examined

24 artefacts of clothing found at the burial site, which you touched upon

25 briefly. Would you agree with me that examining clothing, just like

1 photographs, is a much poorer and imprecise method of ascertaining cause

2 of death and type of injury than actually having the body or other

3 artefacts in addition to the body?

4 A. Yes, I agree with you. You also have to be aware of the situation

5 the expert finds himself in when he has no bodies available, only human

6 remains. He's forced to draw his information from other sources, and one

7 of these sources, that was the video cassette; another source was clothing

8 and also some of the remains that were to be found at the site, including

9 the graves and the examination of the sites itself. But yes, there's no

10 doubt about it. There's no way this amounts to the examination of bodies

11 or post mortem examination.

12 Q. Now, we've touched, or at least you've touched upon this in your

13 direct examination and also in some of the cross-examination of my

14 colleague. In your report you recite what is also contained in the

15 underlying report of the French crew that was at Izbica; namely, that the

16 examination of some of these damaged clothings provided suggestions of

17 being caused by either 12-bore guns and/or 7.62-calibre guns.

18 Now, with respect to those classifications, am I -- and I believe

19 it's also listed in the conclusion of P209, which is the Izbica site

20 report authored by Dr. Walter Vorhauer and Professor Dominique Lecomte,

21 with respect to these classifications - I want to focus on the 12-bore

22 classification which we haven't heard much about - that would relate to

23 damage caused by projectiles from either a hunting gun or a shot-gun

24 rather than an automatic or semi-automatic weapon. Is that correct?

25 A. I cannot answer your question. What is your question? Are you

1 asking me what a 12-calibre weapon is? I cannot answer your question.

2 Could you please rephrase it.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: That is the question.

4 MR. IVETIC: Yes.

5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I'm sorry, but I did not understand

6 the question. What is the question?

7 MR. IVETIC:

8 Q. Let me see if I can rephrase it. Is a 12-bore or 12-calibre gun

9 typically a hunting gun or a shot-gun rather than an automatic

10 military-style weapon, if you know?

11 A. Yes. A 12-calibre gun is a weapon that can be either a shot-gun,

12 a hunting gun, or with -- a two simple-barrel gun, double-barrel gun, or

13 you can have hunting guns that are repetition weapons. But this is

14 manually done, so I do not believe that you are referring to that kind of

15 weapon. You are referring to an automatic weapon. Is that the way I

16 should interpret your question?

17 Q. I think we're again -- we've come to the same conclusion just with

18 different terminology. I was actually talking about hunting guns and

19 shot-guns, and that's my understanding of what a 12-bore or 12-calibre

20 is. So I think we're in agreement on that, if you can help me.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, I'm not sure I understand this. We've heard

22 this reference earlier to 7.62-calibre ammunition and 12-calibre. Now,

23 12-bore is, as I understand it, shot, small pieces of shot, that come from

24 a cartridge.

25 MR. IVETIC: It could also be single shot. It could be multiple

1 or single shot.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: It can be single shot. All right. That clarifies

3 it, thank you.

4 MR. IVETIC: I'm actually relying on the one ballistic record that

5 I objected to, Your Honour, so I'm being a little bit hypocritical here,

6 but that's where I got my information from.

7 Q. Now, with respect to the forensic evidence located from the scene,

8 given that none of the cartridges that were recovered were recovered from

9 the same location as the clothing, that is to say, none of the cartridges

10 were recovered from the burial site, that would seem to indicate that the

11 use of 12-bore weapons cannot be excluded as the potential cause for some

12 of the damage seen to the clothing of some of the victims. Is that

13 correct?

14 A. I believe that what you can read in the expert's report was based

15 on the diameter of the tears that were found in the clothing. The

16 cartridges or cartridge cases that were recovered, that's something else.

17 And if my interpretation is the right one, this has to do with 7.62

18 calibre. Calibre 12 is mentioned, but only in respect to the tears in the

19 clothing.

20 Q. That is correct, Doctor. We are again, I think, at the same

21 point. Now, if we -- I would like to move to this 7.62-calibre munition

22 that was found at various locations in Izbica.

23 In the report, according to the French team, the cartridges found

24 included a multiple variety of different possible weapons, both of

25 suspected Yugoslav origin and also there were munitions found of Chinese

1 origin. Isn't that correct? And I can direct your attention to P --

2 Exhibit P210, page 36, wherein I believe the summary of the French field

3 team talks about these Chinese munitions with a date of 1964 on the

4 cartridge itself.

5 Do you recall that, sir, that there was also Chinese munitions

6 found?

7 A. I did not dwell on that part of the report because I'm not an

8 expert in weapons and ammunition.

9 Q. Fair enough.

10 MR. IVETIC: Your Honours, I think we're going to 3.30 today; is

11 that accurate?

12 JUDGE BONOMY: It is.

13 MR. IVETIC: We're there. I still have about, it looks like, 15

14 questions for the witness.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: All right.

16 Well, Dr. Baccard, that brings our proceedings for today to an

17 end. You will have to come back tomorrow to finish. Tomorrow we'll

18 resume at 9.00 a.m. Meanwhile, I remind you, as no doubt you were

19 reminded before, that it's important not to discuss your evidence with

20 anyone at all between now and continuing tomorrow morning. You're free to

21 talk to whomever you wish about whatever you wish except the evidence.

22 Now, could you please leave the courtroom with the usher, and we'll see

23 you again at 9.00 tomorrow.

24 [The witness stands down]

25 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 3.30 p.m.,

1 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 20th day of

2 February, 2007, at 9.00 a.m.

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