Police officers N.D. from the Herceg Novi Security Department and N.V. from the Kotor Security Department have been arrested on suspicion of abusing their official positions and unlawfully collecting and using personal data, Interior Minister Danilo Saranovic said.
The case was launched after information emerged that details and photographs from a crime scene in the Topla neighbourhood of Herceg Novi had been posted on a communication channel. A crime-scene investigation had previously been conducted there after Russian citizen Mikhail Nikolaevich Shabunin (30) died by suicide.
According to Saranovic, officers from the Police Internal Control Department, together with colleagues from the Herceg Novi and Niksic Security Departments and in cooperation with the state prosecutor at the Basic State Prosecutor’s Office in Herceg Novi, undertook a series of measures and investigative actions to establish all the relevant facts and circumstances.
According to the findings reached by police during the investigation, N.D. allegedly took a photograph at the scene showing the body and subsequently forwarded it to N.V.
As part of the investigation, statements were taken from the two police officers, while, on the basis of warrants obtained and in accordance with the law, searches were conducted at locations in Herceg Novi, Kotor and Niksic.
Following the measures undertaken and the collection of material evidence, N.D. and N.V. were arrested and brought before the state prosecutor handling the case, who ordered that they be held in custody. They were subsequently brought before the investigating judge of the competent court and questioned, while a decision by the judge is pending.
Saranovic said that the security system would continue to investigate information indicating possible contacts between police officers and members of criminal groups, as well as potential abuses of official positions and official information.
On 31 August, Shabunin shot and killed Nemanja Kapor (20), Petar Globarevic (24) and Momir Radonjic (67) at the Ceska Zbrojovka shooting range in Danilovgrad. Following a search lasting several hours, police announced that Shabunin had died by suicide.
