SUPREME COURT HEAD DISMISSES MEDIA CLAIMS ABOUT GUDELJ ACQUITTAL

ZAGREB, Dec 15 (Hina) - Croatian Supreme Court president Marijan Ramuscak on Friday dismissed claims in an article in the latest issue of the Globus weekly saying the same members of the Supreme Court Trial Chamber, who in 1997 acquitted Antun Gudelj in the case of the July 1991 murder of the Osijek police superintendent Josip Reihl-Kir and two other persons, have adopted the decision on quashing the acquittal ruling. The article, headlined "Scandal at Supreme Court", reads that judges with the Supreme Court's Penal Department Katica Jelic, Senka Klaric-Baranovic and Ana Garacic - who in May 1997 applied the Amnesty Law and annulled a verdict by the Osijek County Court sentencing Gudelj to 20 years in prison, "ten days ago voted for the quashing of the decision on Gudelj's release with an easy mind." Claims made in the article are false because the decision on the request for the protection of lawfulness was not made only by judges who participated in the adoption of the contested ruling but by all judges with the Penal Department, Ramuscak says. Citing the Law on Courts, Ramuscak reminds that decisions about the extraordinary legal remedy - request for the protection of lawfulness - against decisions by the Supreme Court Council are made by a session of the Supreme Court Penal Department which includes all judges of that department. The Criminal Procedure Act, which was applied in this case, does not envisage the exemption of judges who participated in the adoption of the contested decision, Ramuscak said. (hina) rml