Supreme Court rejects retrial in case of Ľudmila Cervanová murder
The Supreme Court in mid-June rejected the application by convicted Nitra men for a retrial in the case of medical student Ľudmila Cervanová's murder. The court found a disputed expert report on diatoms to be insufficient evidence to overturn the verdict.
Supreme Court: expert report on diatoms insufficient for retrial of Nitra men
The Supreme Court in mid-June rejected in full the application for a retrial in the case of Ľudmila Cervanová's murder, according to Google News SK — Crime (sk). Simultaneously, it annulled a March decision by the Bratislava Regional Court, which had approved a partial retrial based on a new expert report concerning the location where the medical student was drowned.
The murder and rape of the young medical student occurred in early July 1976. In 2006, six men from Nitra were convicted of these crimes.
Archive discovery in Kanivy as trigger for proceedings
The current proceedings were initiated following the discovery of an expert report from 1977 in the archives of security services in Kanvy near Brno. The report was part of an operational file belonging to Prague criminalist Eduard Pálka, which was found in 2017. On its basis, Martin Hanus wrote the book Hra sa skončila.
The convicted Nitra men claimed that the discovered file contained documents in their favour. They considered key a report concerning analysis of diatoms — microscopic algae — in water from the Čierna voda river and in the victim's body. The report suggested that the composition of river water corresponded to the diatoms found in Cervanová's body more closely than water from the thermal lake, where according to the final judgment she was drowned.
Samples from the lake were taken only in 1981, more than five years after the crime was committed. Experts pointed out that the species composition of diatoms could change over the years. The defence saw in the discovery evidence that cast doubt on the location of the murder and the credibility of statements from 1981.
The Bratislava Regional Court, presided over by judge Peter Šamka, justified its partial approval for retrial on the grounds that the report was new evidence that courts deciding before 1990 and after did not have at their disposal. The convicted men requested a full retrial, annulment of verdicts from 2004 and 2006, and return of the case to preliminary proceedings.
Supreme Court: report incapable of changing verdict
The Supreme Court published its written reasoning via judge Peter Šamka in Právne listy. It did not consider the expert report to be new evidence that could lead to a different decision on the guilt of the convicted men.
The court established that the question of whether Cervanová was drowned in the lake or in the nearby river does not affect the course of events or exclude it. Among the reasons for rejection, it cited the preservation of the identity of the fact — the essence of the offence is not breached, in its view, if circumstances relating to the place or time of commission change.
"For a retrial, it is not sufficient merely to uncritically adopt the alleged facts or evidence from the applicant without evaluating them in relation to the facts and evidence from which the original factual finding resulted," the Supreme Court states in its reasoning.
The court designated as undisputed fact the conclusion of the autopsy and the verdict: the cause of Cervanová's death was suffocation by drowning. According to the verdict, Miloš Kocúr, Roman Brázda and Milan Andrášik threw her into the lake, where they drowned her under the supervision of the other accused, after which, on the advice of František Čerman, they pulled her body from the lake and carried it to the Čierna voda river, into which they threw her.
Geographical proximity of both locations as argument
The Supreme Court pointed to photographic documentation from the investigation file, which showed that the thermal lake was located in the immediate vicinity of the Čierna voda river. It therefore considers a shift in the location of the offence to be insignificant and adds that both locations would have allowed the crime of drowning to be committed.
The court also noted that the conclusions of the expert report cannot be mechanically compared with the record of the forensic autopsy and inferred that Cervanová was drowned exclusively in the river. Whilst diatoms from the Čierna voda river collected on 16 July 1976 did correspond in terms of genus distribution to the diatoms found in the victim's lungs and liver, the court emphasised that this does not in itself mean that the genus distribution of diatoms in the thermal lake could not have been identical at the time of death.
In this context, it also referred to a report from the geological institute, according to which the thermal lake was connected to the Čierna voda river in 1976 — which would naturally explain the similar composition of diatoms at both locations.
Statements of the convicted as further court argument
The Supreme Court also considered Kocúr's statement from June 1981. He testified that Andrášik pushed Cervanová into the water, submerged her head and asked whether she did not intend to report them. Kocúr believed she must have inhaled underwater and thus drowned. Subsequently, according to his own account, he and Andrášik pulled her to the shore, where he tried to feel for a pulse — Cervanová showed no signs of life. He also testified that he attempted to provide her with artificial respiration.
On the basis of these statements, the Supreme Court established that it cannot be ruled out that Cervanová, after drowning in the thermal lake, may not have been immediately dead and her body could have reflexively inhaled in the Čierna voda river after the convicted men carried her there.
Moreover, Andrášik produced his own sketch of the area surrounding the thermal lake during questioning in 1981. In it he marked the places where the accused's cars were parked, the locations of alleged repeated rape, and the position of the Čierna voda river with directional arrows — which, according to the court, further demonstrates that the convicted men were familiar with the mutual arrangement of both locations and their statements were consistent in this regard.
Source: Google News SK — Crime (sk)