Two police officers are ordered to move the body of a young man who was killed in a secret zone where their superior had unofficially legalised drug trafficking. Fearing that both his superiors and journalists might discover his unauthorised scheme, the chief decides to break the law once again by covering up the murder.
Although this is a scene from the television series The Wire, the story bears some resemblance to a case that shook Serbia in mid-May 2026, when Veselin Milić, then head of the Belgrade police, was arrested on suspicion of covering up a serious crime – murder.
Milić is accused of having been present at a restaurant in Belgrade when a 52-year-old man was killed. The victim’s body was later found inside a barrel buried beside a road near the Serbian capital. The murdered man has been linked in the media to one of Serbia’s active criminal groups. In addition to Milić, who remains in custody, several other police officers, his associates, have also been arrested.
Following the murder, Ivica Dačić, Serbia’s Minister of the Interior, issued an order prohibiting any contact with suspicious individuals, even outside working hours. Although such a regulation already exists, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, followed by Police Director Dragan Vasiljević, announced after the crime that a new law would be introduced to prevent cooperation between police officers and criminals.
The case involving the recently departed head of the country’s largest police administration has further fuelled suspicions of collaboration between Serbia’s security services and criminal groups.
Police forces are inherently political everywhere, meaning they are involved in maintaining existing power structures, notes British criminologist Robert Reiner. “Their work should be guided by the rule of law and democratic governance – both externally and internally – but in practice democracy and the rule of law have been undermined by the growing dominance of the wealthy and the super-rich, making the police increasingly accountable to them,” he explained in a written response to BBC Serbian.
In parts of Latin America where criminal groups control territory, corruption within the police is systemic – entire law-enforcement sectors function as part of the criminal order, explains Antonio Nicaso, an Italian expert on organised crime.
“However, in some European countries, weak institutions, the legacy of war, smuggling routes and political-criminal networks create a risk that a Latin American-style model could become entrenched,” he told BBC Serbia. Nicaso describes systems in which gangs cooperate with security structures as “criminalised administrations”. In such hybrid systems, “illegal power uses official institutions as cover”, says the criminologist who studies the activities of the notorious Italian mafia organisations, the ’Ndrangheta and Cosa Nostra.
Who dictates the rules in such relationships depends on the balance of power, he says and adds: “In some places, criminal organisations dictate them. In others, they become instruments of politicians. In the most dangerous cases, they are the product of joint criminal-political action. The gunman pulls the trigger, but the order may come from a gang leader, a politician, a corrupt police officer, or emerge from a tacit agreement among them.”
Security at a “higher level”
Although dozens of bomb attacks, arson incidents targeting restaurants and cafés, and similar crimes have been recorded in Belgrade and other Serbian cities in recent months, officials insist that security conditions have never been better.
“Both in the 1990s and the 2000s we witnessed the gravest criminal offences involving senior police officials who were directly connected to the highest forms of organised crime,” Vučić stated.
According to him, security in Serbia is now “at a much higher level” than during those years, while the overall crime rate is “much lower”. The number of criminal offences in 2025 was 47 per cent lower than at the beginning of the 2000s, Dačić said during Police Day celebrations on 29 May.
“In Serbia in 2026, there is not a single unsolved murder,” Vučić declared at the same event.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Đinđić was assassinated in 2003 in an attack organised by Milorad Ulemek Legija, then commander of special police units, acting in cooperation with leaders of criminal groups. The political background to the assassination and those who ordered it have never been identified.
A year earlier, General Boško Buha, one of the Ministry of the Interior’s highest-ranking officials, was murdered. The trial concerning his murder was conducted against the so-called “Maka Group”, a criminal clan led by Željko Maksimović “Maka”. After the defendants were acquitted at first instance and released from custody, the Supreme Court ordered a retrial. By then, however, members of the group had already fled.
Nicaso notes that institutions are not always entirely corrupt; sometimes only certain representatives, sectors or chains of command are compromised. “The uniform remains a state uniform, but its role changes. Instead of guaranteeing equal protection, corrupt officers may selectively enforce the law, protect allied criminal interests, intimidate opponents, leak information, neutralise investigations or target rival groups. The written law serves as a public façade, while on the ground unwritten criminal rules determine who is protected, who is exposed, and who is allowed to operate,” he adds.
Who oversees the police?
The work of Serbia’s police is monitored, reviewed and assessed through both internal and external oversight mechanisms.
External oversight is conducted by:
- The Government
- The National Assembly (through plenary sessions and the Committee on Defence and Internal Affairs)
- Courts and prosecutors’ offices
- Independent institutions (the Ombudsman, Commissioner for Information of Public Importance, Commissioner for the Protection of Equality, and the Anti-Corruption Agency)
- The public (citizens, media and civil society)
“Unfortunately, institutions in Serbia have been weakened to such an extent that public scrutiny is often the only reliable safeguard,” says Jelena Pejić of the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP), adding: “And even then, only if someone records unlawful conduct on a mobile phone or publicly exposes it, creating sufficient pressure to force the authorities to do their job.”
Unlike Serbia, some countries also have professional external oversight bodies dedicated specifically to supervising police work, she notes.
The Internal Control Sector (ICS – SUK in Serbian) oversees the conduct of police officers as well as all other Ministry employees. It carries out integrity tests, corruption-risk analyses, reviews of changes in assets, and security vetting of appointed chiefs, directors, commanders and generals.
The sector is composed mainly of former police officers and people from within the system; outsiders rarely join, Pejić explains. “This creates a degree of institutional familiarity. The ICS most often delays investigations and appears more inclined to cover up scandals and protect officers than to investigate and sanction them.”
She also sees a problem in the fact that the sector’s work is overseen by the Minister of the Interior.
“The ICS is completely dependent on the minister, who issues guidelines and mandatory instructions. This opens a channel for political influence.”
How does the Internal Control Sector operate?
The ICS acts on its own initiative, at the request of a competent public prosecutor, on the basis of collected information and intelligence, or following complaints from ministry employees and citizens. If it detects irregularities, it informs the minister and, where a criminal offence is suspected, the public prosecutor. In cases involving human-rights violations, it contacts the Ombudsman.
The sector may propose disciplinary proceedings and file criminal complaints, but it does not keep records of their outcomes, nor does it oversee secondary employment undertaken by police officers. “The new draft legislation no longer even formally states that the sector operates independently in operational matters, which should be a basic standard,” Pejić warns.
For years, the department has been headed by acting directors appointed without open competition or full mandates, making them vulnerable to dismissal at any moment. Over the past five years, between 146 and 240 criminal complaints per year have been filed concerning unlawful conduct by Ministry employees, most commonly against general-duty police officers, according to ICS reports.
In more than 50 per cent of cases, complaints related to suspected corruption.
Between 18 and 30 per cent involved criminal police officers, while the fewest complaints concerned the gendarmerie – around eight per cent.
An analysis of publicly available data by the BBC found that, over the past five years, the ICS recommended the initiation of more than 300 disciplinary proceedings annually within the Ministry. Existing data indicate that, in most cases, no professional misconduct was ultimately established. In recent years, the Ombudsman has submitted dozens of requests to the Ministry seeking the determination of responsibility for police failures.
Dismissals of the “unsuitable” and appointments of the “loyal”
Since anti-government protests erupted following the Novi Sad tragedy that claimed 16 lives, numerous reassignments, dismissals and appointments have been recorded across various police units.
Spasoje Vulević, commander of the Special Anti-Terrorist Unit, was unexpectedly removed from his position, with Minister Dačić vaguely explaining that it was part of a “reorganisation”. The colonel, described as having an “impeccable career”, spent 33 years in the elite unit, including two decades as its commander. Following his sudden dismissal, he “retired early at his own request”.
He was offered the position of ministerial adviser but declined.
Earlier, Police General Bogoljub Živković was also retired early after his son participated in protests. Frequent reorganisations are useful because amendments to staffing regulations can bypass standard recruitment procedures, including competitive selection processes, says Pejić and adds: “It becomes easy to remove and transfer unsuitable personnel while appointing loyalists to key positions, often without appropriate qualifications. The transfers have also shown that officers are rewarded rather than punished for exceeding their authority, using excessive force, and mistreating or humiliating protesters.”
Pejić also questions the appointment process for heads of regional police administrations, noting that they have no fixed term and need not come from the cities in which they serve: “Their accountability is determined hierarchically, without any role for local communities. If the rules are not clear and verifiable, there is a greater risk that loyalty and connections, rather than competence, knowledge and experience, will determine appointments.”
She cites the example of Marko Kričak, head of the Personal Protection Unit, whom a female student accused of abuse – allegations immediately denied by the Ministry. The unit had no authority over public gatherings, “yet it still intervened and demonstrated loyalty to the political leadership.” “It has become a breeding ground for appointments to key positions, even within the Criminal Police Directorate, where Kričak was transferred. It is difficult to overstate how worrying this is, particularly when police links to organised crime have been exposed by the murder in a Belgrade restaurant,” she adds
Police Director Vasiljević maintained that “neither the Personal Protection Unit nor Marko Kričak exceeded their authority” during the protests of summer 2025.
The Ministry stated that Kričak was appointed head of the Criminal Police Directorate because, during the previous year, he had distinguished himself through active participation in safeguarding state security and had “selflessly and unconditionally defended Serbia’s constitutional order”.
Alleged police misconduct
Since Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party came to power in 2012, several cases have raised suspicions of police misconduct:
- The demolition of buildings in central Belgrade in 2016 to make way for the luxury Belgrade Waterfront development, along with assaults on those who opposed it, while police failed to intervene.
- The alleged use of a “sound cannon” during anti-government demonstrations on 15 March 2025.
- Excessive use of force during protests in Valjevo, Belgrade and Novi Sad.
- The “Jovanjica” case, involving a large cannabis plantation where a record quantity of marijuana was discovered. Court proceedings are still ongoing. Former Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin, a close Vučić ally, was linked to the case but was never formally charged, while some investigating police officers were dismissed.
- The “Konjuh” case, involving a village near Kruševac in central Serbia where police seized five tonnes of marijuana from premises linked to a ruling Serbian Progressive Party official.
Since 2012, four ministers have headed the Ministry of the Interior: Nebojša Stefanović, Aleksandar Vulin, Bratislav Gašić and Ivica Dačić. All of them, except Dačić, have been or remain members of Vučić’s party and close political associates. Dačić, meanwhile, is the long-time leader of the Socialist Party of Serbia, which has either governed or participated in ruling coalitions since the 1990s, apart from a brief period after the fall of Slobodan Milošević’s regime in the early 2000s.
Is there a solution?
According to Nicaso, cooperation between police forces and criminal groups is often harder to detect today than it was decades ago.
“In the past, unlawful arrests, direct political protection, local intimidation, missing files or the obvious shielding of fugitives were easier to spot. Today the methods are more sophisticated: leaks from police databases, encrypted communications, manipulation of public contracts, protection of money-laundering networks, cybercrime, port logistics, and relationships conducted through lawyers, accountants, entrepreneurs and intermediaries,” Nicaso adds.
Corruption has not disappeared, he warns; it has become more complex and more difficult to prove.
Italy – particularly its southern regions – spent decades in the grip of the mafia and has not yet entirely freed itself from organised crime. Nevertheless, it succeeded in dismantling the old protection system through the work of courageous prosecutors and judges, the confiscation of criminal assets, specialised anti-mafia institutions and strong civil-society engagement.
“The system cannot be defeated from within alone. Pressure must come simultaneously from above, from outside and from below. The key lesson is that the mafia must not be treated as ordinary crime. It must be confronted as a system of power, relationships, money, violence and political protection,” Nicaso concludes.
(BBC Serbia, 02.06.2026)