Prosecutor Orders Criminal Charges Against Isidora Mijanovic

Belgrade’s on duty prosecutor at the First Basic Public Prosecutor’s Office has ordered police to file criminal charges against Isidora Mijanovic for theft. The case stems from an incident on Friday, August 7, at the Galerija shopping mall in Belgrade, one we first reported on while the wife of actor Sergej Trifunovic was still giving her statement at the police station.

The charges will proceed through regular criminal proceedings. The offense is classified under Article 203, paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code, which carries a fine or a prison sentence of up to three years.

The prosecutor’s office informed the media of the decision:

The duty public prosecutor has ordered police officers to file criminal charges against Isidora Trifunovic in regular proceedings for the criminal offense of theft.

The statement uses the surname Trifunovic, which she has carried since marrying. On Instagram and in the media, she goes by Isidora Mijanovic.

What happened in the store

She entered a fitting room carrying several bags and a large number of clothing items. As she left the store, the anti-theft sensor at the door went off. Security asked to check her belongings, she refused, and an argument followed. Police were called only after that.

A jacket was found in her bag. She told police it had accidentally stayed among her things after she tried it on. She is charged with theft, and the presumption of innocence applies until a final verdict.

Our story from August 8 reported that she was taken to the police station following the intervention and that Sergej Trifunovic came in himself to give a statement. At that point, all that was known was that the case was in police hands. Now the prosecutor’s decision is known too, and that is the only new fact in this story.

Why the jacket is a criminal offense, not a misdemeanor

The threshold is 5,000 dinars. Below that amount, it counts as petty theft, handled as a misdemeanor. Above it, the case becomes a criminal offense. Reports put the jacket’s value at around 8,000 dinars, while the earliest coverage of the case cited a price of 8,990 dinars. That gap of three thousand dinars above the threshold decided which column the case fell into.

That is why the charge is not going to a misdemeanor court but into regular criminal proceedings, with Article 203 in the heading.

Second run in with authorities in two years

This is not the first time Isidora Mijanovic has faced Serbian authorities. Two years ago, misdemeanor charges were filed against her under the Foreigners Act, because she, as a Croatian citizen, had not registered her residence in Serbia. The prescribed penalty for that ranges from 10,000 to 50,000 dinars, more than the price of the jacket now behind the criminal charge.

After being held on Friday, she did not want to talk to reporters outside the station about the case. She said only:

I only came to pick up documents.

The couple married in 2024 and recently celebrated their second wedding anniversary.

The post that set off a wave of comments

The case has been spreading on social media since Friday. One post about the jacket collected several thousand reactions and shares, with comments mostly focused on the price of the item and the name of the couple attached to it.

That is also the biggest difference from the misdemeanor charge filed two years ago, which passed almost unnoticed. Back then, the prosecutor found no elements of a criminal offense. This time the decision is different, and the name of the offense appears in the prosecutor’s own statement.