The main hearing in the case of ordering the murder of journalist Ján Kuciak, as well as in the case of the preparation of the murders of the prosecutors, continues on Wednesday at the Specialized Criminal Court (ŠTS) in Pezinok with the reading of statements. The defendants and the victims are not present in the hearing room.
- The main hearing in the case of the murder of Ján Kuciak continues with the reading of the victims’ statements.
- The defendant, Marian Kočner, submitted an initiative for a preliminary question to the Court of Justice of the EU.
- Senate President Mazúch adjourned the main hearing until March 30 for personal reasons.
- Marian Kočner denied ordering any murder and criticized the media and Threema.
- Marček, Szabó and Andruskó are sentenced to long sentences for the murder of Kuciak.
The representative of the victims Roman Kvasnica informed on the delivery of a statement on the initiative of the defendant Marian Kočner’s defense to submit a preliminary question to the Court of Justice of the EU. The Chairman of the ŠTS Senate, Miroslav Mazúch, asked him to submit this statement to the court through the registry office.
The trial then continued with the reading of the statements of the victim Petr Šufliarske and the witness Jozef Kuciak the younger. The chairman of the Senate of the ŠTS announced that he will suspend the main hearing on Wednesday at 12:45 p.m. for personal reasons until March 30, when the next date of the main hearing is scheduled. He had already declared that the witness Iľja Weiss should be questioned at that time.
At Monday’s (March 9) main hearing, defendant Marian Kočner testified. Among other things, he said that he had never ordered a murder in his life. He also addressed communication from the Threema application and criticized the media. On Tuesday (March 10), the trial continued with the reading of the victims’ statements.
In the case of Kuciak’s murder from February 2018, in which his fiancee Martina Kušnírová also died in Veľká Mača in the Galanta district, Marian Kočner and Alena Zsuszová are facing indictment on her order. The Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic 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.
Apart from Marian K. and Alena Zs, the prosecutors are facing indictment for the preparation of the murders. also Dušan K. and Darko D. According to the indictment, the order for the murders of Maroš Žilinka and Daniel Lipšic should have arrived in autumn 2017. In the case of Petr Šufliarske in 2018. However, they were not implemented.
