Padinska Skela: Prosecutor Seeks 18 Months for Five Staff

Belgrade Higher Court heard closing arguments on October 21, 2026 in the trial of five employees of the Padinska Skela correctional facility, who are charged with negligence in office over the death of inmate S. B. (74). The prosecutor asked that each of them be sentenced to a year and a half in prison, and the first-instance verdict is scheduled for November 6.

Who is on trial and what happened in February 2024?

The defendants are physician V. S., shift leader S. K. of the Security Service, who was assigned as a junior supervisor, and three commanding officers, D. K., S. P. and Z. K. According to the indictment, their failings cover the period from February 1 to 4, 2024. S. B. died on February 4, 2024.

He was serving time at the facility over an unpaid misdemeanor fine. Prosecutors say his cellmates beat, abused and sexually assaulted him. A separate case was brought against three cellmates over his death, and they have already been convicted at first instance.

The evidence phase of the trial against the employees ended on September 17. One witness had been summoned that day but was away at a spa for rehabilitation, so the defense dropped the request to question him. The defendants briefly denied guilt at that point. In the indictment, prosecutors had asked that all of them be found guilty and given prison terms, but the prosecutor set the specific sentence only in the closing argument.

What is each defendant accused of?

The prosecutor named a separate failing for each of the five:

• S. K. did not tell his superiors that S. B. could not walk and was feeling unwell.
• D. K. saw that S. B. was injured but wrote “condition normal.”
• Z. K. did not pay attention to the fact that the inmate was unwell that day.
• S. P., who witnessed the situation, did not realize he should alert superiors when the doctor said S. B. was lying down.
• The doctor, according to the prosecutor, “took for granted” the explanation that he had fallen in the bathroom. She examined him the day before he died and noted injuries, but did not photograph them or look into their cause.

The indictment also says they acted negligently even though they knew this could lead to a serious violation of the right to life, which, according to prosecutors, happened on February 4, 2024.

The prosecutor summed up the position in the closing argument:

“An inmate cannot be left to arbitrariness and violence. It is not enough merely to be present on a shift; one has to act to prevent violence. By failing to act, they breached their duties and a man lost his life.”

The prosecutor also said the trial had shown that care for the protection of inmates’ rights was lacking. “Throughout the proceedings, the defendants showed a lack of empathy,” the prosecutor said.

What do the family and the defense say?

The family’s attorney, Pavle Rasic, argues that the prison warden, contrary to the rules, moved all inmates punished for misdemeanors from the open ward to the closed one. He says the prison administration, not the employees, is responsible for the outcome:

“The employees are not responsible for putting misdemeanor inmates in such conditions. The prison administration brought those inmates to a state in which they showed the worst of themselves.”

All defense lawyers asked for an acquittal. In their words, it has not been proven that the defendants acted negligently, the victim never complained to anyone, and nobody knew what was happening in the cell. The defense also said the case amounts to “shifting institutional blame onto the weakest,” because a tragedy cannot be the responsibility of employees at the lowest rung of the chain of command.

Attorney Vuk Tufegdzic, who represents S. K., pointed out that S. B. was placed in a room with younger people who had prior convictions, and added that had he complained to anyone about being mistreated, he would have been moved. Attorney Ivana Jovanovic, who represents D. K., said intent to commit a crime was not established, and that her client told the medical service that S. B. was not well, took him to be examined and informed a colleague. Miro Orovic, the doctor’s attorney, said no expert had assessed her conduct and that the assessment had been made by laypeople.

In their closing statements, all the defendants expressed regret over the inmate’s death, but repeated that they are not guilty and that S. B. gave no sign that he was suffering violence.

What happens next?

Belgrade Higher Court is due to deliver its verdict on the five employees on November 6, 2026. The first-instance decision will be the first ruling on the employees’ responsibility, since S. B.’s cellmates were already convicted at first instance in a separate case. All of the defendants are presumed innocent until a final verdict.