Memić Case: How Did the Footage from Hotel Crystal for February 8 and 10 Disappear?

The report of the Ad hoc body, which identified shortcomings in the work of the Ministry of Interior of Sarajevo Canton and the Police Administration in the Dženan Memić case, established that footage from the fateful night of February 8, 2016, from the video surveillance of the Hotel Crystal for the period from 9:30 PM to 11:00 PM existed, but that it disappeared. This was reiterated today at the protests held in Velika Aleja, the place where Dženan sustained the injuries from which he died. To this day, his death has been shrouded in a veil of mystery, writes the Patria agency.

- On Friday, February 19, 2016, a direct inspection by official persons established that for February 8, 2016, in the period from 9:30 PM to 11:00 PM, there is operationally interesting footage showing a vehicle arriving in the wrong direction down a one-way street. The vehicle came from the direction of Vrelo Bosne, stopped, and lingered near the Hotel Crystal – the report states.

As explained, the footage was not seized because a power outage occurred in the immediate and wider area that day. Police officers came again at 1:00 PM, but even then, due to the power outage, they did not seize the footage.

- An authorized person came to the Hotel Crystal to seize the footage only on Monday, February 22, and determined that the aforementioned video surveillance system contained no recordings, which had previously been “recorded by direct inspection on Friday, February 19, 2016” – the report states.

It was established that the video surveillance contained no recordings for February 8, 9, and 10, and that there is suspicion that they were “deliberately removed, although they had been present.” It is particularly interesting that there is no footage from February 9 either, when the police investigation continued and when "pieces of plastic and light green paint were found."

The question arises as to why the Cantonal Prosecutor's Office did not launch an investigation against the persons responsible for these omissions before filing the indictment, and why it did not determine the motives and interests of all those who had access to the said system.