The Specialised Criminal Court in Pezinok accepted the prosecutor’s proposal of a prison sentence of nine years for the Hurbanovo police officer who, while off duty, shot dead three local people and seriously injured two others. The gunman, identified as Milan J., originally faced a life sentence for homicide, but after psychiatry experts stated that he had committed the crimes in a state of “markedly reduced sanity”, the prosecutor proposed a reduced punishment, the TASR newswire wrote.
In his concluding speech before the Specialised Criminal Court on Wednesday, the prosecutor stressed that the crime was, nevertheless, committed not in a reactive, coincidental way, but was premeditated. He also concluded that in spite of his reduced sanity, Milan J. could be deemed to have been totally insane when he committed the crimes in June 2012. In addition to his prison sentence, the prosecutor proposed that the court order three years’ protective treatment in a hospital or mental institution. The defendant briefly expressed regret for his actions, according to TASR. The court accepted the prosecutor’s arguments and consented to his sentencing proposal.
The shootings took place on June 16, 2012, shortly after 10:00. Milan J., then aged 51, parked his car in front of the house of a Roma family and proceeded to shoot dead a 44-year-old man, his 19-year-old son and 24-year-old son-in-law. A second son was shot in the lung and the son’s wife was shot in the leg. The police located the gunman about an hour later, sitting in front of the house of Hurbanovo’s mayor, Margita Zemková, the SITA newswire wrote.
Sources: TASR, SITA
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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