Appeals court rules against accused in attempted murder of Mimoza Kusari

The Court of Appeal has finally acquitted Mikel Qupin of charges of attempted aggravated murder and illegal possession of a weapon.

Qupi was accused by the Special Prosecution Office of the Republic of Kosovo (SPRK) of the attempted aggravated murder of the former mayor of Gjakova, Mimoza Kusari-Lila, and Prek Radi.

The Basic Court in Gjakova also issued an acquittal against Qupi in December of last year, after assessing that there was insufficient evidence.

However, the SPRK was not satisfied with the decision of the Basic Court, which had filed an appeal with the Appeals Court, requesting that the case be retried.

According to the SPRK's appeal claims, it was stated that the first instance court committed an essential violation of the provisions of criminal procedure since the enacting clause of the judgment, according to the prosecution, is unclear and contradictory to itself and the reasoning of the judgment.

Likewise, the SPRK claimed that the Basic Court's judgment was not based on the facts and evidence processed in the judicial review, so that each piece of evidence was not evaluated one by one and, based on the evaluation of the evidence, clear and concrete conclusions were drawn regarding the decisive facts, but only which evidence was found to be trusted by the court and which not without convincing reasoning.

The second instance court rejected these claims of the SPRK as unfounded.

"The Court of Appeal has carefully reviewed the first instance judgment, the Prosecution's appeal, and the case files and assesses that the judgment challenged in the appeal does not contain any essential violation of the provisions of criminal procedure. The same has presented the reasons for each point of the judgment, it has clearly and completely presented which facts and for what reasons it considers proven or unproven," the Appeals Judgment states.

Furthermore, according to the Appellate Court's assessment, the first instance court in the judgment provided reasons for the decisive facts, justified each piece of evidence separately, linking them to each other, and correctly and completely establishing the factual situation.

According to the Appeal, the case files, the testimonies of witnesses and the injured parties have not been able to prove the prosecution's claim that the accused ordered the murder of Mimoza Kusari-Lila and Prek Radi, since neither the motive or reason for the accused to do such a thing has been proven, since there was no dispute or conflict of interest with the injured parties.

This, according to the Appeal, is also confirmed by the testimony of Mimoza Kusari-Lila, who stated that she first heard about the accused when she was informed of the case, that she had no business with him, nor with any member of his family, and that from this the possibility of a conflict of interest cannot be proven.

The Appeal also assessed as correct the fact that the first instance had not given credence to the cooperating witness Gramos Nokshiqi, since his testimony is contradictory not only with his statement, but also with other evidence administered in the main trial.

Otherwise, this case is based on the indictment of the Special Prosecution, dated December 28, 2015, in which Mikel Qupi was accused of having planned and engaged Gramoz Nokshiqi and Alberto Sheqerukaj, citizens of the Republic of Albania, in July 2015, with the aim of depriving the injured party Prek Radi and the former mayor of the Municipality of Gjakova, Mimoza Kusari-Lila, by promising them sums of money up to 300.000 euros.

In this case, together with the above-mentioned, they are accused of having committed the criminal offense of "aggravated murder" in attempted form in connection with the criminal offense of criminal conspiracy.

Mikel Qupi was also accused of possessing, until July 2015, a sniper weapon with two pairs of binoculars, a "C.Zastava" revolver and 400 grams of explosives on his premises without a permit.