Hodak Killer Found By Accident, Gun Found on Dec 4

ZAGREB, CROATIA - - Following an extensive police criminal investigation, the police had successfully solved the murder of Ivana Hodak. The perpetrator has never before been charged for a crime. The police have enough leads and material evidence against him to file criminal charges for murder against him – police director Krunoslav Borovec said at the beginning of an extraordinary news conference which was called after the arrest of a person suspected to have killed Ivana Hodak on December 6, 2008. 

- The motive of the murder was revenge against her father, whom the perpetrator believed responsible for his difficult life – Borovec said.

The person whose identity was not revealed by police, worked at the Mladost tennis courts in Zagreb until 1995. He expected Zvonimir Hodak to fix him up with a job, but since somebody else got the job he was wanting, the perpetrator felt Zvonimir Hodak was responsible for his hardships. When he lost his job, he lived off of what the Unemployment Bureau gave him for a while, and then he sold his flat for 90,000 German Marks. He left to Zapresic to live in a flat he rented and when he spent all the money he made from the sale of his flat he again began thinking about the reasons why he lost the job and money. And he saw Zvonimir Hodak as the chief culprit for his hardships.

Ivana fell after the first shot and the killer shot her again and ran away 

- The gun with which Ivana Hodak was killed was in illegal possession of the arrested suspect. On December 4, he was arrested in Zapresic for vagrancy and the police found in the barn he slept in a gun and several boxes of cigarettes because he was dealing in small-time smuggling at the time – Borovec said, adding that after ballistic tests were conducted, it was established that that was the gun from which Ivana Hodak was killed.

The perpetrator was arrested again, on February 5, on suspicion of murdering Ivana Hodak. But, Borovec said, despite the sufficient amount of evidence, the police will continue to do more testing because traces on the suspect’s clothes are expected to be found.

Ivana Hodak’s killer, who knew the entire Hodak family, told the police everything he had been doing on December 4, when Ivana was killed. Accordint to spokesman Borovec, the perpetrator spent the night in a barn in Zapresic and in the morning took a bus to Zagreb’s Crnomerec neighbourhood. From there he went towards Pavla Hatza Street where the Hodak family lived.

- Some time before 11 o’clock, the perpetrator saw Ivana and started after her, trying to catch up with her. Before the entry doors to the block of flats closed behind Ivana, the perpetrator caught up with her. He ten shot one bullet from the gun. When Ivana fell to the ground, he shot her another time. After that the perpetrator walked to the main train station, to the Sava embankment from which he returned to Zapresic – Borovec said.

As part of investigating this case, the police spoke to 672 people of whom 58 were criminally processed. Of the some 80 tests completed, tests are still being done on the clothes taken from the perpetrator.

It should be said that, in consults with the State Prosecution, the police characterised Ivana Hodak’s murder as murder with no special circumstances, which is somewhat of a legal precedent that is contrary to provisions of the Penal Code. The perpetrator killed Ivana Hodak out of revenge after 13 years. According to the development of events described in the police report, it was evident that the murder was committed with premeditation and passion, which would automatically qualify his act as murder in the first degree.

- I have not seen a case like this in all the 30 years I’ve been working in the police – crime police sector head, Bozo Guvo, said in the end.

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