"We called that building the 'Death Cell'. It was packed with people, there was complete silence inside, and shots of celebration outside," said protected witness P007 who participated in the defence of the town as a member of the civil defence.
"We heard the cries of women asking for their husbands to return. There was complete chaos," said the witness, who testified with his face hidden.
He said that a soldier with long, blond hair carrying a rifle in one hand and a bottle of brandy in the other entered the building, saying that all prisoners would be executed within half an hour.
"There was fear and panic, we were certain that we were sentenced to death. We only exchanged looks, without speaking," the witness said.
He also recalled a man nicknamed Capalo, whom he knew from before the war, walking by a group of prisoners with a knife and a man's head in his hands.
The situation changed when a JNA officer and four soldiers entered the building and told the prisoners to go outside. The prisoners were put on a military bus and taken to the nearby village of Negoslavci, from where they were transported to a prison camp in Sremska Mitrovica in Serbia.
The witness said that on November 19 he saw a JNA officer in front of the Vukovar Hospital who introduced himself as Major Sljivancanin.
"I remember that he was very strict and that he told a man wearing a white overcoat to go give orders in his own country, because he was in charge there.
Retired general Mile Mrksic, who in 1991 commanded attacks by the JNA and Serb forces on Vukovar, and his subordinates Miroslav Radic and Veselin Sljivancanin, are charged with crimes against humanity and violations of the laws and customs of war committed through the massacre of at least 264 wounded persons and soldiers taken from the Vukovar Hospital and executed at the Ovcara farm outside the town on 20 November 1991.
The witness will continue his testimony on Friday, when he will be questioned by defence counsel.