The Cantonal Prosecutor’s Office of the Tuzla Canton submitted to the pre-trial judge of the Tuzla Cantonal Court a proposal to order custody measures for eight persons who are suspected of having committed the criminal offense of human trafficking and related to the exploitation of two girls born in 2009 for the purpose of prostitution, among whom are four officers of the Police Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of TK. The detention measure was proposed for police officers: Besim Kopić (51), Miralem Halilović (46), Jasmin Modrić (30) and Dževad Požegić (55), and for Šemsudin Kadrić (39), Zijad Jagodić (61), Sulejman Šehić (67) and Nedim Avdić (41).
Kopić, Kadrić, Halilović, Modrić and Šehić are suspected of having recruited, lured, transported to different locations in the area of Kalesija, Živinice and Srebrenik, handed over and hid two fifteen-year-old girls for the purpose of exploitation through prostitution and other forms of sexual exploitation, and they also used their sexual services for which they were paid. Part of the money from sexual services, which the girls were forced to have with other people, was taken by the first suspect, Besim Kopić.
Jagodić, Požegić and Avdić are suspected of using their sexual services and paying them for it in the mentioned period, even though they were aware that the girls were minors and victims of human trafficking.
These are two girls whose development was hampered by difficult family circumstances and who were placed in social institutions in the Tuzla area, as well as the shelter of the Home for Children without Parental Care Tuzla, from where they ran away several times and were returned by police officers and centers for social work. The suspects took advantage of their escape from the institutions and their state of helplessness in order to recruit and lure them into prostitution and use their sexual services.
The Prosecutor’s Office of the Tuzla Canton, in cooperation with the investigators of the Criminal Police Sector-Department for Combating Organized and Computer Crime of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Turkey, conducted several months of investigation and worked on documenting these crimes.
Investigative actions in this case are continuing.
In the Cantonal Court of Tuzla, a hearing is currently underway based on the Prosecution’s proposal to order custody of the suspect.
(TIP/Photo: Federalna.ba)
