Just days after Serbia’s parliamentary elections, a justice system that for years had been accused of keeping case files in drawers has begun moving at an unusual pace. Police officers, institution heads, local officials and names linked to the outgoing power structure have been swept up in a wave of arrests that raises the main question: why did these investigations become possible only after Aleksandar Vučić’s party lost power?
Arrests began immediately after the elections
According to data published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the first two weeks after the October 25 elections were marked by successive arrests on suspicion of corruption, violence against students, election manipulation and abuse of official position.
Although the new government has not yet been formed, the victory of the Student List with 140 seats against 103 for Vučić’s list appears to have changed the climate inside state institutions. Two days after the vote, the Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office set up a five-member commission to review the work of 87 prosecutor’s offices across the country, paving the way for the re-examination of blocked cases and the launch of new investigations.
Prosecutors acknowledge case files had been held hostage
Senior public prosecutor Goran Illić, who heads the commission, has acknowledged that there were obstacles at several levels of the justice system in investigating cases. According to his account, the blockages came not only from the police, but also from prosecutors themselves and from the courts.
This admission reinforces the perception that many cases did not suffer from a lack of evidence or complaints, but from a lack of institutional will. For years, civil society organizations in Serbia have denounced inaction or the selective use of powers by prosecutors’ offices, especially in cases of high public interest.
The student case and suspicions of evidence being concealed
Among the most serious cases now under investigation is that of August 14, 2025, when several students and citizens were allegedly mistreated in the garage of the Serbian Government building after a protest against the authorities. Over this case, Marko Kričak and nine other former and current members of the Unit for the Security of Certain Persons and Facilities have been remanded in custody for up to 30 days.
According to the prosecutor’s office in Belgrade, the investigation was also obstructed by the lack of video footage. The responsible institutions had not submitted security camera recordings, and it was later communicated that the recordings were automatically deleted after 30 days. The prosecutor’s office has raised suspicions that the responsible bodies deliberately waited for the retention period to expire before responding.
Among those mentioned as suspects in this case is also the commander of the Special Anti-Terrorist Unit, Igor Zhmiriç. Kričak, considered the key figure in the case, is also being held in custody in another matter linked to a murder investigation in Belgrade.
From a death in police custody to banking: the wave reaches several levels of power
After two years, eight Criminal Police officials have also been arrested, suspected of mistreating and torturing Dalibor Dragijeviç, who died in April 2024 while in police custody in Bor. At the time, the Ministry of Internal Affairs had said the death occurred from natural causes, but earlier prosecutorial orders for arrests had not been carried out by the Internal Control Sector.
The list of people under investigation or in detention does not stop with the police. It also includes the director of Zabela prison, the director of the Serbian Hydrometeorological Institute, the provincial secretary for Social Policy, as well as a senior official in the economic administration in Novi Sad.
Also at the center of attention is Alta Bank owner Davor Macura, who faces accusations that he withdrew more than 380 million euros from the bank’s treasury. The bank has had its license revoked and bankruptcy proceedings have begun.
Political pressure has eased, but questions remain
According to chief prosecutor Zagorka Dolovac, political and institutional obstacles that had previously hampered the work of prosecutors’ offices were removed after the elections. But that explanation raises an even more serious question for the institutions: if those obstacles existed for so long, who bears responsibility for failing to act on complaints, evidence and cases of public interest?
Representatives of the Student List have called on prosecutors’ offices to act urgently and impartially, as well as for the resignation of senior prosecutorial officials in Belgrade, whom they accuse of selective handling of cases. The YUKOM organization has also said that, in addition to the suspected perpetrators of criminal offenses, the responsibility of prosecutors who previously failed to act should also be investigated.
At its core, the latest developments in Serbia are being read not only as an action against corruption and abuse of power, but also as a delayed exposure of how justice can be kept frozen as long as a political shield exists.
The wave of arrests has created the impression of a system finally beginning to move, while at the same time highlighting how deeply justice can be blocked when politics controls its pace.
That is precisely what makes the current moment in Serbia more than a crime story: it is public proof that the case files were not missing — what was missing was permission to open them.