ICTY ENDS INVESTIGATION INTO DOKMANOVIC DEATH

( Editorial: --> 9468 ) THE HAGUE, July 23 (Hina) - An internal investigation into the circumstances of last month's death in custody of former Vukovar mayor Slavko Dokmanovic has confirmed that the cause of death was suicide. It also found Dokmanovic's suicide was not the result of negligence and disrespect of prison rules by prison personnel, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) spokesman Christian Chartier said on Thursday. After Dokmanovic's suicide, on the night between June 28 and 29 in his prison cell in Scheveningen, parallel investigations by the ICTY and Dutch police were launched. It is expected that the police investigation will be completed this week. The ICTY's investigation team concluded that no proof of violent death was found either in the cell or on the body of the accused. Dokmanovic hung himself by a tie wrapped around a cupboard door hinge in his cell, the investigators determined. The four-member team also confirmed from the marks on the body that Dokmanovic had made two unsuccessful suicide attempts on the same night. Guards who monitored Dokmanovic every half hour did not notice anything unusual. A guard decided to enter the cell just before midnight when he saw that there was no light in the cell. Investigators established that Dokmanovic used a fork to create a short circuit in the cell. Prison rules say that a single guard is not allowed to open the cell door. Hence, the cell was opened five minutes after midnight in the presence of three guards, Chartier said. All prison security rules were enforced and no neglect by the personnel was determined, the investigation team concluded. ICTY had no official information that Dokmanovic was likely to commit suicide. The Belgrade psychiatrist Vera Petrovic reported last year that he showed no inclination towards suicide, Chartier added. When asked by journalists why Dokmanovic had not been put under the tightest supervision which included placing cameras in his cell, after his lawyer on June 26 in a telephone conversation warned that Dokmanovic could commit suicide, Charter said that the prison doctor had concluded Dokmanovic's mental state was not poor enough for him to be sent to an isolated cell or be supervised every 10 minutes. Dokmanovic was accused for participating in the organised execution of prisoners from the Vukovar hospital on November 20, 1991. At the time he was the president of the Vukovar municipal assembly and a minister in the "government" of the Serb District of Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srijem. Dokmanovic's trial began on January 19 and ended on June 25. He had committed suicide while awaiting a court verdict. (Hina) mbr jn /mro 231931 MET jul 98