By: Janja Strah
The Slovenian judiciary has once again proved that it uses double standards, one for first-rate and the other for second-rate citizens and employees of the third branch of government. If you are part of the “initiated”, nothing can happen to you, even if you slander and insult people.
One of the latest cases are now former judge Zvezdan Radonjić and judge Urška Klakočar Zupančič. In the first case, they are relentless, because he dared to tell off judicature and talk about the inadmissible pressures of the deep state. He warned that at the end of the day this hurt the little man. Zvezdan Radonjić therefore landed in disgrace as a second-rate.
The opposite happened to Urška Klakočar Zupančič. She was “brave”. She fought against “Janšism”, Janez Janša, and all supporters of his policy, voters, over 220 thousand of them. She became first-rate. Let’s go step by step.
A “heroic” judge and an excluded judge
Urška Klakočar Zupančič wrote on social networks: “I hope that the era of Janšism will one day be just a bitter memory, but until then take care of yourself… Everyone can think their own, but I like such rhetoric much more than Beović, Krek, Bregant, Kacin, and the great dictator Janša.”
For this record, she was, so to speak, praised as a first-rate. This is the Slovenian reality, about which not much is known in Europe or elsewhere, and above all, no one problematizes it. Namely, the focus there is selling an imaginary story about media pressures that are supposedly happening in Slovenia. We have already witnessed the European Union’s “strong” worry for respecting the rule of law in Slovenia in the case of the Patria affair, when opposition leader Janez Janša was imprisoned just before the 2014 elections.
Zvezdan Radonjić dared to resist the pressures and talk about it out loud. He was the judge in the case of the murder of Janko Jamnik, the former director of the Institute of Chemistry in Ljubljana. He should have convicted the innocent Milko Novič for murder. Instead of orders, he followed the law and was therefore excluded from the judiciary. He became the target of those who are subordinate to the interests of the deep state.
What applies to him does not apply to her
Ljubljana District Judge Urška Klakočar Zupančič was initially dismissed as the head of the department due to her records. She appealed, of course, and was acquitted as a first-rate before the disciplinary commission of the Judicial Council. Prior to that, the Commission for Ethics and Integrity of the Judicial Council found that no violation of the principles of the Code of Judicial Ethics could be established in the judge’s conduct. Describing the Prime Minister as a great dictator has upset many, but not the members of the Judicial Council. They followed the position of her legal representative, who emphasised some time ago that judges are also people who have the right to political conviction and expression of their views, especially when it comes to drawing attention to irregularities in society and the functioning of the state.
However, obviously, irregularities in the operation of society should not be pointed out by everyone. When Judge Radonjić dared to do so, there were no signs of understanding from the judges. He said that “there was no evidence that Milko Novič is guilty” and pointed out “severe pressure he received” during the trial. He revealed that immediately after the first court hearings in the Novič case, pressure began on Marjan Pogačnik, the president of the District Court in Ljubljana. They pressured him to discipline Radonjič, so that he would start judging as is proper. As Pogačnik “failed” to do so, a media attack followed. Fictions began to spread.
Radonjić said that decisions about his so-called penalties (he was suspended) undoubtedly reach to the very top of the judiciary. Already at that time, he announced that because he wanted to ensure a fair trial, he would never be promoted, most likely he would also find himself in suspension. His predictions came true.
It should be added that disciplinary proceedings were first instituted against Radonjić in court, citing public criticism of the judiciary as a reason for it. The vice-president of the Supreme Court, Miodrag Đorđević, then imposed a temporary suspension on Radonjić in August last year.
Radonjić demands the removal of Branko Masleša
Radonjić’s suspension was also confirmed by the Judicial Council, but now the former judge has already appealed to it. He filed a lawsuit, the first hearing before the senate of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Slovenia took place recently. Branko Masleša, former President of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Slovenia, sits in the latter’s senate. Radonjić demands his expulsion, the reasons are of a completely legal nature.
Due to the request for exclusion, for which Masleša sees no reason, the hearing was suspended and will continue on May 14th. Radonjić also accuses the court of not recording the hearing, and also requests access to the file on the disciplinary proceedings of the Judicial Council against the judge of the District Court in Ljubljana, Urška Klakočar Zupančič. Namely, he wants to compare his statements with hers.
In connection with the Radonjić case, we should also mention the comment of a lawyer Dr Blaž Kovačič Mlinar, who wrote it on Twitter. He pointed out that he had witnessed much more severe verbal outbursts of judges than those we had witnessed in Radonjić case. At the same time, he cited the case of an unnamed judge in Brežice who, with his statements, is openly hostile to women. “A judge at the Brežice District Court is openly hostile to women (and a very devout Muslim), and everyone knows about this problem, but nothing happens,” he added.
Finally, let us mention the case, Branko Masleša, who is in the role of the President of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Slovenia and, according to witnesses, explained in the inn how Janez Janša should be “fucked” in the Patria case. He was not even laid a finger on.
Exposed the “deep state” in the judiciary
Zvezdan Radonjić, a former judge and current lawyer, received the decision of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Slovenia on the suspension from the position of district judge in Ljubljana on August 12th last year. It was signed by Miodrag Đorđević with a validity the very next day. Radonjić was even banned from coming to court. Radonjić said about this way of working that these people (in courts) live in the Stone Age, “they are completely convinced of their own omnipotence that no one can harm them.”