- A specialized criminal court admitted communications from Threema as evidence in the case of Kuciak’s murder.
- The court rejected the motion of the defense of Marian Kočner to not admit the evidence from Threema.
- Marian Kočner and Alena Zsuzsová are facing charges for ordering the murder of Kuciak.
The Senate of the Specialized Criminal Court (ŠTS) will admit communication from the Threema application from a seized mobile phone as evidence in the case of the murder of investigative journalist Ján Kuciak in February 2018. This follows from the statement of the chairman of the Senate, Miroslav Mazúch.
The motion for non-admission of evidence in the form of communication from the Threema application was submitted by the lawyer of the defendant Marian Kočner, Marek Para. The court rejected this proposal. “The Senate of the Court of First Instance is also bound by the legal opinion of the Court of Appeal in this particular matter, and the Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic last decided on this matter on May 20, 2025, while in the justification of its decision it stated and issued an instruction to read the reports from the application,” explained Mazúch.
Para insists this is illegal evidence. “ŠTS only said that it is bound by the opinion of the Supreme Court, which did not comment on this topic at all. We will continue by presenting a preliminary question,” he emphasized. According to him, the defense will work with this evidence in favor of Marian Kočner.
Prosecutor of the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Slovak Republic Peter Kysel pointed out that his colleagues proposed the evidence already when the indictment was filed. “There is also the addition of evidence by colleagues in appeal proceedings, where the request for data extraction is on a larger scale. We will see how the court deals with the evaluation of the evidence as such,” he added. According to the representative of the Kuciak family, Roman Kvasnica, there is also data from other applications in this case that can serve as evidence.
At Monday’s main hearing, Darko D., the defendant in the case of the preparation of the murders of prosecutors Maroš Žilinka and Daniel Lipšic, testified. “I have no connection with the case,” he emphasized. As he added, he only knows the witness Iľjo Weiss. He decided not to answer any questions of the procedural parties. Subsequently, the defendant’s previous statements were also read. Dušan K. responded that he saw Darko D. for the first time at the main hearing in Pezinok.
The chairman of the senate adjourned the hearing shortly before 5:00 p.m. It will continue on Monday, February 9. Interrogations of other defendants are planned. However, they have the right to refuse to testify, or to undergo an interrogation only during the proceedings. Later, the victims and proposed witnesses will also be heard.
In the case of the murder of Kuciak from February 2018, in which his fiancee Martina Kušnírová also died, the couple Marian Kočner and Alena Zsuzsová are facing charges from her order. The Supreme Court annulled the previous two judgments. The case was brought to the ŠTS for the third time. The perpetrators of the murder, Miroslav Marček and Tomáš Szabó, were previously given 25-year non-parole sentences, Zoltán Andruskó 15 years non-parole.
In addition to Marian Kočner and Alena Zsuzsová, Dušan K. and Darko D. are facing indictment for preparing the murders of the prosecutors. According to the indictment, the order for the murders of Žilinka and Lipšice should have come in the fall of 2017. In the case of Petr Šufliarske, in 2018.
