18th Abduction - James Patterson Page 0,33
to the court, and after four years at trial, Nikolic was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Several high-ranking officers of the Serbian Army were also sentenced. The victims’ families had crowded the courthouse and the streets around it to glimpse the monsters who had assassinated a hundred thousand civilians.
One of those grief-stricken wives, a young mother, told a reporter, “They had to be held responsible. But even with the justice done, there is nothing the tribunal could do that would be sufficient punishment for these men.”
Joe was sure that Anna’s feelings were the same.
There had been a more prominent person on trial, and her photos had flashed across the curved face of the old TV on its stand at the head of the table.
Jelena Jovanovic looked completely ordinary, a stiffly coiffed white woman of a certain age who would’ve been at home behind a counter in a department store or at a cocktail party in Georgetown. But the seventy-two-year-old woman was the former president of Serbia, known as the Iron Lady. Jovanovic had been an unapologetic proponent of ethnic cleansing of non-Serbs, Muslims in particular, calling the eradication of non-Serbian people a “natural phenomenon.”
After governance issues and confrontations with her cronies, Jovanovic retired from politics. But she didn’t get far enough to avoid scrutiny by the International Criminal Court.
The year following her retirement, Jovanovic learned that there was a sealed indictment against her containing numerous counts of genocide and crimes against humanity. She denied the crimes and voluntarily turned herself in to the ICC to stand trial.
While waiting for trial, Jovanovic had an apparent change of her so-called heart. She pleaded guilty on all counts and even recanted her earlier position, stating that the victims of her purge had been innocent.
Back at Quantico, Joe, along with members of the counterterrorism agencies, had watched the announcement of the trial chamber’s decision. He had been stunned to hear the court announce that Jovanovic’s confession and admission of guilt would be more meaningful to the survivors of the still war-torn country than a guilty verdict after a many-years-long trial.
Where was the justice in that?
In return for pleading guilty to war crimes, the genocide charges had been dropped. Jovanovic had been sentenced to fifteen to twenty-five years for crimes against humanity, but before serving a day, her sentence had been reduced to eleven years, to be served in a Swedish prison that featured all of the amenities of a first-class resort.
Later her sentence had been further reduced to five years for time served and good behavior, and at age seventy-nine, after six years of imprisonment, she had been released.
How had this happened?
Had Jovanovic gotten her break not just in exchange for her confession but for giving up information on other military officers, in this mother-of-all-grande-dame deals? The unbelievable kicker was that once she was free, Jovanovic retracted her confession in full, saying that she had confessed only in order to get a lenient sentence.
No kidding.
After reviewing the disposition of Jovanovic, Joe felt more certain that Petrović was free because he, too, had gotten a plea deal.
Petrović had been a colonel. He had taken orders from generals who’d gotten life sentences for genocide and crimes against humanity.
Bigger fish.
If they were obtainable, Joe wanted both the facts on Petrović’s deal and the terms of his release. For God’s sake, how had it come to pass that the Butcher of Djoba had opened a steak house in San Francisco?
CHAPTER 44
Joe was hungry, but he didn’t want to stop his work to go home and eat.
It was still afternoon in DC.
Joe punched numbers for the State Department into his phone, and when his call was answered, he asked to speak with deputy director Brandon Reilly. The call was switched over and Reilly picked up.
After some catching up, Joe said to Reilly, “Do you remember a colonel in the Serbian Army named Slobodan Petrović?”
“That evil scumbag. I remember. He drowned or something, didn’t he?”
“If only.”
Joe sketched it in for Reilly, that Petrović was living in San Francisco, very much alive and well. Once he’d caught Reilly up, Joe made the ask: information on how the bastard had skated on a life sentence for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Reilly said, “Hang on.”
Joe did and was relieved when Reilly got back on the line.
“Molinari, still there?”
“Yes. What do you know?”
“It looks like Petrović rolled on a few people in the high command in exchange for immunity. There were seven indictments and convictions as the result of the information he