After a panel of judges on Monday upheld an Office for the Suppression of Corruption and Organised Crime (USKOK) indictment against eight men accused of defrauding the Podravka food company of at least HRK 400 million (approx. 54 million euros), defence attorneys said they would submit to the Zagreb County Court evidence which undermined the indictment and prove that the accused had actually tried to prevent a hostile takeover of the company.
Now that the indictment has been upheld, the defence will be able to submit its own evidence for the case file, which it was not allowed to do so before.
Leaving the panel of judges hearing, one of the defence attorneys, Mate Matic, told reporters that the "Norwegian company Riber & Son didn't want to take over just 25 per cent of Podravka, but 100 per cent. We have a document proving that, which means that our claims about a hostile takeover weren't made up, but facts which exist on paper. We will try to have this document entered into the case file on Friday and someone will have to take a position on it."
Asked if the prosecution was aware of this document, Matic said he did not know, but that the original had been stored at Zagrebacka Banka the whole time.
The defence had tried to have this "key piece of evidence" entered into the case file at one of the hearings with the panel of judges deciding about the indictment, but the panel's chairman, Judge Ivan Turudic, would not let them. Today he also dismissed all motions to throw out all evidence which the defence considered unlawful.
Although the defence now has a new opportunity to have its evidence entered into the case file, which has more than 40,000 pages, this evidence has no bearing on the indictment until the trial.
Earlier today, after the panel of judges upheld the indictment accusing former Deputy Prime Minister Damir Polancec and seven others of defrauding Podravka in a case codenamed Spice, Turudic said all objections by the defence could be understood as vague aspects of the Criminal Procedure Act and that the indictment had been compiled fully in accordance with the law.
Apart from Polancec, the other accused are former Podravka executives Darko Marinac, Zdravko Sestak, Josip Pavlovic and Sasa Romac; the owner and director of the SMS company, Srdjan Mladinic; a co-owner of the Fima Grupa company, Milan Horvat; and attorney Zoran Markovic.
Apart from conspiracy to commit crimes, they are also charged with abuse of office, aiding and abetting abuse of office, and illegal intermediation.
