Human Trafficking Indictment: Three Victims in Belgrade
Belgrade's Higher Public Prosecutor's Office indicted two men on human trafficking charges. One allegedly withdrew money from a victim's account 59 times, the other withheld another woman's documents.
The Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office in Belgrade indicted Zivorad C. (35) and Vorih I.V. (31) on August 12 on charges of human trafficking. The indictment covers conduct from November 2021 to February 19, 2026, and names three victims, one of them a minor. It has been submitted to the Higher Court in Belgrade for a confirmation ruling.
The two defendants are not accused of the same conduct, and it does not involve the same woman in both cases.
Which acts are attributed to which defendant?
Zivorad C. faces a single count of human trafficking. According to the prosecutor’s statement, between May and November 2025 he
recruited the victim for prostitution and sexual exploitation by abusing her trust and her difficult circumstances.
Vorih I.V. is charged with aiding in that same offense. The indictment brings two further, separate human trafficking counts against him, involving two other victims and different time periods.
Withdrawals from the first victim’s account
What lies behind that charge becomes clear from an earlier statement the prosecutor’s office issued in the same case. According to the prosecution, Zivorad C. first entered into a romantic relationship with the victim. At the time she was unemployed and in debt, renting a room where she lived with her mother, grandmother, minor siblings and her own two-year-old son.
He took her to a location in the Kovin municipality and cut her off from her family and child, then brought her to Belgrade, to an apartment Vorih I.V. had rented beforehand. They posted ads advertising prostitution on internet sites. After they returned to the town in the Kovin area, the prosecution states, Zivorad C. demanded that she continue working as a prostitute in Belgrade, rent apartments herself, and pay him all her earnings through a money transfer agent.
“In that way he withdrew money 59 times, for a total of 852,100 dinars. To keep her with him and working as a prostitute, and to stop her from fleeing or reporting him to police, Zivorad C. forced her using violence, hitting her hands against her head and body, grabbing her by the throat, and threatening to kill her and to harm members of her family because he knew where they lived,” the prosecutor’s office stated.
The withdrawals and the violence described in that statement concern that victim and are attributed to Zivorad C.
Withholding a second victim’s identity documents
Vorih I.V. is separately charged with human trafficking against a second woman, over two periods: from November 2021 to July 2022, and from October 2023 to February 19, 2026. According to the indictment, he used force and threats, abused her trust and difficult circumstances, withheld her identity documents, and recruited her for prostitution and sexual exploitation.
The third count concerns the minor victim, covering the period from July 2025 to February 19, 2026. According to the indictment, he recruited her for prostitution and sexual exploitation by abusing her trust and difficult circumstances, and by deceiving her and keeping her deceived.
Detention and the earlier stage of proceedings
The prosecutor’s office has asked the court to extend Vorih I.V.’s detention. Zivorad C. is already serving a prison sentence for another criminal offense, which the prosecutor’s office did not specify.
At his hearing before the prosecutor handling the case, Vorih I.V. denied committing the offense. Zivorad C. was already in detention on another case at the time, so he was questioned later.
The indictment is not final. Guilt will be decided by the court, and until a final verdict both defendants are presumed innocent.
