Nis: six arrested over attack on Student List bikers
Ten days after the attack near the Firefighters' Hall in Nis, six people were arrested, including a former adviser to Novica Toncev, Nova.rs reports.
Six people have been arrested in Nis, ten days after the attack on bikers from the Student List’s mobile teams, who were touring polling stations on election day, October 25. The news was first published on November 4 by the portal Nova.rs, and other media have since picked it up.
According to Nova, those arrested are A. A., V. P., M. M., his son P. M., B. M. and B. K. Because guilt has not been established, the suspects are identified here by initials only.
Who is among those arrested?
Nova reports that B. K. was previously an adviser to Novica Toncev. The available sources give no further detail on the others, except that M. M. was arrested together with his son.
Searches were still under way when the report was published, according to the same source. In the apartment of suspect B. K., officers found watches, narcotics and expensive cigarettes. The sources do not say whether those items are linked to the attack itself or to some other investigation.
What happened on October 25?
After the attack, the bikers said a group of men had used cars to block their path near the Firefighters’ Hall in Nis. According to their accounts, some of the attackers carried metal bars, and one biker was physically assaulted and injured.
The Basic Public Prosecutor’s Office in Nis described the attack on election day itself: one person struck a biker through a car window, first with a hand and then with a bar, hitting him in the shoulder. The prosecutors then ordered police to establish the identities of those involved, collect statements and obtain medical documentation of the injuries.
The arrests of November 4 are, therefore, the first known step since that order. Until then, the sources we reviewed contain no information about suspects.
What is still unknown?
The available sources do not say what criminal offense the arrested men are charged with, nor do they tie anyone to a specific role in the attack. They also do not say in what capacity each person took part, or whether any of them was in the car from which the biker was struck.
In the sources we reviewed there is also no statement from the police or the prosecutors about these arrests. The names, the number of people arrested and the results of the searches rest for now on information published by Nova.rs, so these details may change once the authorities release official data.
All suspects are presumed innocent until a final verdict.
