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ST. LOUIS (AP) — A magistrate judge will decide if a former Bosnian military policeman now living in Missouri should be sent back to face war crime charges for allegedly raping an imprisoned pregnant Serbian woman during the Bosnian war in the early 1990s.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Patricia Cohen on Tuesday gave the attorney for 58-year-old Adem Kostjerevac 30 days to file a response to the extradition request. Cohen is expected to rule in December.
Kostjerevac, who has lived in St. Louis County for 17 years, didn't speak during the hearing, but he cried before it began as his attorney, Kayla Williams, quietly comforted him.
According to a court filing outlining the extradition request, Kostjerevac was indicted in Bosnia in 2015 for "war crimes against civilians." The request wasn't made until August.
Kostjerevac served with the army of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The extradition document alleges that he repeatedly raped the woman, who was a neighbor of his, following her arrest in September 1992, causing her to have a miscarriage.
According to the court filing, she weighed just 81 pounds (37 kilograms) when she was released in a prisoner exchange in February 1993. She has been suicidal at times since her captivity and suffers from "sub-depressive signs and intrusive fear," the request states.
Williams said she will argue that the victim was mistaken in identifying Kostjerevac as her assailant. She said after the hearing that the woman said she was assaulted by a man with a mustache, which Kostjerevac didn't have. She also cited a nickname for the assailant that Kostjerevac did not use.
"The biggest issue is identification," Williams told the judge.
Kostjerevac doesn't deny knowing the woman, but he told FBI agents that he never raped her and that he saw her just once while she was in custody, the court filing states. Kostjerevac said he actually gave her food and protected her when others tried to kill her.
Assistant U.S. Attorney John Ware said that much of the Bosnians' case against Kostjerevac is built on the victim's statements.
"I think it's fair to summarize this as a he-said-she-said incident," Ware said.
Topics
- General news, Sexual assault, National courts, Bosnian War, War crimes, Extradition, Military legal affairs, International law
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ST. LOUIS (AP) — A former military policeman in Bosnia who has been living in Missouri for about 17 years is facing extradition to his native country, where he is accused of raping a pregnant Serbian woman who was being held as a prisoner in 1992.
Adem Kostjerevac, 58, who lives in unincorporated southern St. Louis County, will appear in federal court Tuesday in St. Louis for a hearing on an extradition request from the Bosnian government.
An extradition request filed by the government alleges that Kostjerevac, who served with the 1st Muslim Brigade of the army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, raped the woman in a small village after she was arrested Sept. 17, 1992, by Muslim forces who surrounded her village. The arrest occurred during the Bosnian war that raged from 1992 until 1995.
The woman, who was a neighbor of Kosterjerevac's, said she was later raped several times by a guard at a different location, according to the request. The multiple assaults caused her to miscarry, and when she was released in a prisoner exchange on Feb. 5, 1993, she weighed just 81 pounds, according to the request.
The woman testified before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in 2005.
Kostjerevac told FBI agents in St. Louis in 2014 that he saw the woman — who had been his neighbor and the wife of a former classmate — in custody but rather than raping her, he sent her food and protected her when others tried to kill her, according to the request. He also said he saw the woman only once.
Kostjerevac, who came to the U.S. with his wife and who has five adult children, was indicted in Bosnia in 2015. Court documents say he suffers from PTSD, memory lapses, diabetes, high blood pressure and has had a heart attack. He cited his health problems as the reason he failed to voluntarily appear in Bosnian court.
The extradition request was filed on Aug. 14 of this year but remained sealed until after Kostjerevac was arrested on Aug. 23.