For a long time, many family members of Jan Kuciak, friends, colleagues and a large part of the public were convinced: The murder of the Slovak investigative journalist and his fiancé Martina Kusnirova, committed on February 21, 2018, will never be solved, let alone brought before a court. Most people in Slovakia had too little trust in the state and the judiciary.
But in this case they were surprised. Investigators arrested the alleged perpetrators and their accomplices, later they also identified the alleged client. The trial against the alleged perpetrators and backers now begins on Thursday. A special court in the small town of Pezinok north of the Slovakian capital, Bratislava, is negotiating.
It will probably be one of the most important processes in the history of Slovakia, which has been independent since 1993. The double murder shook the country deeply and triggered a political crisis, the consequences of which are still having an impact today.
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Slovakia: A double murder, a political crisis, a trial"I am happy and have great expectations for the process," journalist Peter Bardy told SPIEGEL. He is the editor-in-chief of the updity.sk portal where Kuciak worked. "Jan was my friend, and I just didn't want to imagine that you can't find your murderers and that you can't bring them to justice." The journalist Arpad Soltesz, who heads the "Jan Kuciak Investigative Center" (ICJK), told SPIEGEL: "It almost seems like a miracle to me. The police and public prosecutors really did an excellent job."
According to Soltesz, the main reason for the trial is the months of civil protests after the murder. Government politicians and senior officials from the police and judicial system, unlike usual, would not have dared to hamper investigations and stall legal proceedings because of the extremely high public pressure.
The process is an important signal to the public
The former professional soldiers Miroslav Marcek and Tomas Szabo are charged with alleged murderers, and the businesswoman Alena Zsuzsova and her confidante Zoltan Andrusko as accomplices and middlemen. Zsuzsova is said to have paid 70,000 euros for the murder, Andrusko was the contact person for the murderers.
He was the only one to cooperate with the police almost from the start and made an early admission. This could mitigate punishment if convicted. His cooperation made it easier for investigators to reconstruct the murder. The evidence against these four defendants is overwhelming.
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Defendant Kocner: From time to time, worse things come to light
The central figure in the proceedings, however, is the fifth accused: the entrepreneur Marian Kocner, 56, presumably the person who ordered the murder. He made headlines with dubious business in Slovakia for many years. Kocner is considered the epitome of organized crime in the country with diverse connections to the judiciary and high politics.
Immediately after the double murder, the entrepreneur was among the suspects - he had verbally threatened Kuciak several times in the months before the murder because of his investigative research into Kocner's business. Kocner has been in pre-trial detention since June 2018 for suspected fraud, document falsification and tax evasion, and the lawsuit against him is ongoing. Investigators came on his track as the alleged client of the murder by decrypting thousands of messages from the Threema communication app on his confiscated smartphone.
The process is so important, above all because of Kocner, the Slovakian political scientist Grigorij Meseznikov told SPIEGEL. "It is a very important signal to the public so that people can regain trust in the state institutions."
"Our country needs a radical change"
Paradoxically, the successful investigation against Kocner has shaken public confidence even more in recent months. Slovakian media have been publishing transcripts of Kocner's decrypted Threema messages since August this year. From time to time, worse things come to light.
The businessman controlled and bribed politicians, senior government and police officers, judges, prosecutors, journalists and intelligence officers. They all covered up his fraud and covered up investigations against him. The most frightening case to date documents how Kocner, together with Attorney General Dobroslav Trnka, who was in office from 2004 to 2011, plans to blackmail, installs a hidden camera in his office and gives him instructions.
"Our country needs a radical change to become more democratic again," says political scientist Meseznikov. "I hope it will be launched by the general election in February next year." However, he does not see a quick recovery. Even with parties in power who advocate democratization of Slovakia, the change will take years.
