Parents of Serbia school shooter go on trial

The suspected school shooter was just 13 years old at the time of the attack, making him not criminally liable under Serbian law – Copyright AFP/File OLIVER BUNIC

The parents of a 13-year-old accused of killing 10 people in a school shooting last year went on trial in the Serbian capital Belgrade Monday.

The massacre last May — and a second mass shooting a day later — rocked the Balkan nation, setting off major anti-government demonstrations that coalesced into an opposition coalition that stood in recent elections. 

Prosecutors said the teenager — now in a mental hospital — shot nine of his classmates and a security guard in his Belgrade school with his father’s weapons.

They said the father had trained the boy to shoot, did not properly secure his weapons and ammunition and allowed his son to hide a handgun and 92 bullets in his backpack that he later used in the shooting. 

He is also charged with a “serious act against general safety”.

The mother is also accused of illegal possession of ammunition. 

“I expect a legal and fair trial, at the end of which the court will convict the defendants of the criminal offences against them,” chief prosecutor Nenad Stefanovic told Serbian broadcaster RTS Monday. 

Prosecutors have also charged the head of a Serbian shooting club and an instructor for providing false testimony.

The boy was 13 at the time of the attack, making him not criminally liable under Serbian law.

Serbia has one of the highest gun ownership rates in the world, with 39 firearms for every 100 civilians, according to the Small Arms Survey project.

After the shootings, President Aleksandar Vucic vowed to “disarm” the nation with an ambitious plan that would crack down on both legal and illicit firearms. 

Despite the pledge, the shootings sparked massive anti-government protests as tens of thousands called for the resignation of top officials and an end to the glorification of violence and gangster culture in the media. 

Vucic largely dismissed the protests as a “political” stunt, and peddled conspiracy theories about foreign powers allegedly orchestrating the rallies.