The bodies of the priest and his parents were found in a well in September 2001 in the village of Rizvanovici near Prijedor.
Last week, the Banja Luka district court acquitted 11 former policemen from Prijedor who were accused of the Matanovics' "unlawful arrest and detention in Prijedor from 24 August to 19 September 1995".
Commenting on the verdict, local Roman Catholic dignitaries said they had never claimed that the 11 ex-policemen or their commander Simo Drljaca, who was killed in a 1997 operation led by multinational peace forces, were responsible for the murder of the priest and his parents.
"We claim that the authorities of the Republic of Srpska are responsible for the unlawful arrest of the Prijedor parish priest and his parents, their being placed under house arrest... and their death. Matanovic, his parents, and another seven priests and a nun were not the victims of unknown groups but of the then official structures of authority (of the Bosnian Serb entity). Besides, such was the ruling of the international Human Rights Centre (court) in Sarajevo in 1997 in the Matanovics vs. Republic of Srpska case," reads a press release issued by the office of the Catholic bishop in Banja Luka .