A Bosnian Muslim told the U.N. war crimes court Friday how a man who called himself the
Serb Adolf Hitler held a gun to his chest and played ``Russian roulette.'
The genocide trial continued of Goran Jelisic, a former farm mechanic accused of a bloody murder spree in May 1992,
when he was only 24, against the Muslim population of the northern Bosnian town of Brcko.
A member of the Bosnian Serb police, Jelisic was a familiar figure in Luka detention camp, where the prosecution says
he boasted of killing at least 500 Muslims. Luka identified himself as the ``Serb Adolf' at a court hearing last year.
Jelisic pleaded guilty last October to 12 named murders but denied genocide, the U.N. Yugoslavia tribunal's gravest
charge. If convicted, he is likely to receive a life prison sentence.
Leading British pathologist Albert Hunt pieced together the final minutes of 70 murder victims buried in four mass graves near Brcko. Two of the
61 men wore pajamas, a 13-year-old girl was among the dead and another woman appeared to be naked.
``The multiplicity of gun wounds in the head and upper part of the body were not characteristic of combat,' Hunt told the court.
A report by tribunal investigators described how bodies were shoveled into pits, up to three meters deep and 10 wide. Mechanical diggers had
torn away limbs, quicklime had been sprinkled over rotting corpses, and rubble from demolished mosques strewn across the site.
A religious figure in the local Muslim community, identified as Witness R, told the court how Jelisic collected him from his home and drove him
to Luka for questioning. He said he heard the wails of a man gunned down by Jelisic outside the Serb's office.
``Jelisic said that was his 83rd case. I thought he meant his 83rd killing that day,' Witness R said, hidden by a screen.
Jelisic then slowly and deliberately loaded two bullets into a pistol and held it to R's chest. ``He said: 'Let's play a game of Russian roulette'. He
pulled the trigger. Thank God for me it was an empty shot. Then he said: 'Even God won't take you'.' |
