The ICTY five-member Appeals Chamber, presided by judge Mohammad Shahabuddeen, thus confirmed Kvocka's sentence of seven years in prison, and Prcac's sentence of five years in prison. It also confirmed former guards Zigic's and Radic's sentences of 25 and 20 years of imprisonment respectively.
Kvocka, who was also the first commander of the Omarska camp, and Prcac were found guilty on the basis of their individual responsibility for persecution on political, racial or religious grounds which the tribunal treated as a crime against humanity and for killing and murders which was treated as a violation of the laws and customs of war in Bosnia-Herzegovina during the war in the 1990s.
Radic and Zigic, notorious as very cruel guards, were found guilty also of inhumane acts, murders, rapes and tortures, which were crimes against humanity, and cruel treatment and humiliation, which represented violations of the laws and customs of war. Zigic also operated in another two Serb-run camps, Keraterm and Trnopolje in northern Bosnia.
The fifth indictee from this indictment, Milojica Kos, was sentenced to six years in prison. He was released in July 2002 after serving two thirds of his term.
Kvocka, Radic and Kos were arrested by the NATO-led peace keepers in Bosnia known as SFOR in 1998. After that Zigic turned himself in to the tribunal. Prcac was arrested by SFOR in March 2000.
The trial against Kvocka and the others, which commenced on 28 February 2000, took 114 days of main hearings. The closing arguments were presented in July 2001, and the trial chamber proclaimed the ruling in November that year.
According to the indictment, "between 24 May 1992 and 30 August 1992, Bosnian Serb authorities in the Prijedor municipality unlawfully segregated, detained and confined more than 6,000 Bosnian Muslims, Bosnian Croats and other non-Serbs from the Prijedor area in the Omarska, Keraterm, and Trnopolje camps. In Omarska camp the prisoners included military-aged males and political, economic, social and intellectual leaders of the Bosnian Muslim and Bosnian Croat population. There were about 37 women detained in the camp. At the Keraterm camp, the majority of the prisoners were military-aged males. At the Trnopolje camp the majority of prisoners were Bosnian Muslim and Bosnian Croat women, children, and the elderly, although men were also interned there either with their families or alone".
"Living conditions at Omarska and Keraterm were brutal and inhumane. The two camps were operated in a manner that resulted in the physical debilitation or death of the non-Serb prisoners. The general living conditions were abject. Prisoners were crowded together so badly in the various rooms of both camps, that often they could not sit or lie down. There were little or no toilets or facilities for personal hygiene. The inadequate supply of water the prisoners received at both camps was usually foul. They had no change of clothing, no bedding, and virtually no medical care. The prisoners were fed starvation rations once a day. In addition, in Omarska, they were given approximately three minutes to get into the canteen area, eat, and get out. The trip to the canteen was often accompanied by beatings and other abuse," the indictment read.
"Severe beatings, torture, killings, sexual assault, and other forms of physical and psychological abuse were commonplace at Omarska and Keraterm. The camp guards and others who came to the camps used all types of weapons and instruments to beat and otherwise physically abuse the prisoners. At a minimum, hundreds of prisoners, whose identities are known and unknown, did not survive the camps".
Interrogations, which were conducted on a daily basis at the Omarska and Keraterm camps, were regularly accompanied by beatings and torture. Non-Serbs who were considered as extremists or to have resisted the Bosnian Serbs were often killed, the document added.
Judge Shahabudeen ordered that the convicts remain in custody of the ICTY until the completion of all arrangements for their transfer to the countries where they will serve their sentences.