After six months of extensive investigations, the Special Prosecutor’s Office (SDT) issued an indictment against PzP leader Nebojsa Medojevic, a businessman from Banja Luka Momir Nikolic and their associates. They are charged with being leaders of a criminal group that was laundering money ahead of and during the election campaign.
Medojevic told CdM that he had not received the indictment yet and that he would inform the public about it and respond after he received and red it.
SDT submitted the indictment to the High Court in Podgorica.
In addition to Medojevic and Nikolic, PzP director Dejan Vujisic, the party’s technical secretary Zeljko Scepanovic (Medojevic brother in law) and a local foreign currency street dealer Gordan Konatar are among the accused as well.
The indictment also includes Iva Pavlovic, Petar Draskovic, Luka Radunovic, Vladislav Bulatovic, Nikola Jovanovic, Mladen Jovanovic and Aleksandar Sekulovic.
SDT suspects that Medojevic and Nikolic thought up a plan to legalise the money Nikolic obtained illegally through his construction business, as Tivat-based Graditelj company’s entrepreneur. They aimed not to present those assets as revenues to the competent authorities and thus evade paying taxes.
Investigators found that on several occasions Nikolic had received from abroad almost €1m on his bank account. Those suspicious money transfers were mostly from the former Soviet republics, now EU members. According to the information obtained by the investigators, in a single transaction, Nikolic received €175,000 from Lithuania. They suspect those were transfers of money through Russian companies based in Lithuania.
Since 19 October last year, investigators have been figuring out who was involved in the money laundering network and what the fraudulent scheme for covering up the origin of the disputed dollars was like. Transactions of Scepanovic and Konatar came into lime light last year in October, when they were caught with money of suspicious origin.
Then, police seized €30,000 from Scepanovic and €18,000 from Konatar. It was later found that Scepanovic exchanged $100,000 in euros on at least three occasions. Investigators believe that the money was intended for the payment of field activists engaged during the election campaign. The investigation showed the money intended for payment of PZP activists during the election day was kept in a safe of a Podgorica-based bank.
