Bad translation in October before the prosecutor

The court interpreter for the Spanish language will be heard on the report of Krstović - accused of smuggling cocaine

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Budimir Krstović is brought in for questioning (archive/illustration), Photo: Luka Zejkovic
Budimir Krstović is brought in for questioning (archive/illustration), Photo: Luka Zejkovic
Disclaimer: The translations are mostly done through AI translator and might not be 100% accurate.

Basic Prosecutor Denis Zvrko postponed the hearing of the court interpreter for the Spanish language, Jeanne Tasan Mazoko, to October 5.

Budimir and Marina Krstović filed a criminal complaint against her, because in the proceedings against them for smuggling 1.206 kilograms of cocaine, she translated messages from English - which was not in her job description.

She admitted three months ago in the Podgorica High Court that it was a wrong translation. In the meantime, a new translation of the disputed communication was submitted to the Court.

The hearing of the court interpreter for the Spanish language, Jeanne Tasan Mazoko, was postponed at her request, as she asked to be allowed to hire a lawyer to attend her questioning.

At the beginning of June, at the main trial in court, she apologized for translating the communication from English, between the accused Marina Krstović and the owner of the company from Ecuador, Carlos Falquezi.

"It took me away. If I am sinful, may God forgive me... I apologize for being sinful, if I have harmed anyone," she said.

Judge Vesna Kovačević then ordered the interpreter to only translate the communication from Spanish to Montenegrin, adding: "Forget the English language, don't touch that part."

The defense attorneys of the accused Krstović, who claim that it was precisely the wrongly translated messages, were key to the filing of the indictment and claim that a new translation of the disputed communication was delivered to the court.

They estimate that this translation completely confirms that their clients have nothing to do with the smuggling of 1.206 kilograms of cocaine.

"This is an important piece of evidence, since the prosecution's indictment rests entirely on those communications. I will remind you that out of 6.000 messages for VDT, only those two or three messages were disputed. Here, based on this evidence, we see that those messages were translated in a scandalous way, that is, that they were only aimed at forcibly creating a well-founded suspicion in relation to our defendants", said the defense attorney of the accused Krstović, lawyer Stefan Jovanović.

And his colleague and also the defense attorney of the defendants, lawyer Dragoljub Đukanović, claims that the wrong translation is to blame for the indictment

"This current official and completely regular translation showed that the previous translator misused and made the translation incorrectly, and from that translation came the indictment and everything that happened in that case," he said.

However, the defenders do not reveal what the real translation of the messages is, but they claim: "There is not a single word that is disputed and that is not in the spirit of business between the two companies on the banana trade."

It was recently announced at the trial that the original message reads: "Looks like wk 29 they will slifr puerto bolivar port - it will have to be Guayaquil that's what msc Serbia toid me".

Translation by Žana Tassan Mazzocco: "It seems that on Sunday the 29th, the ship will bypass the port of Bolivar - as I was told by MSC Serbia, they expect trouble there."

Appeal again before the Constitutional Court

The higher state prosecutor's office in Podgorica filed an indictment against the defendants Krstović, for the criminal offense of unauthorized production, possession and distribution of narcotic drugs, i.e. cocaine in the amount of 1.206,253 kilograms.

The accused Krstovići were arrested in August of last year, after cocaine was found hidden among packages of bananas in the warehouse of their company "San Francisco", in the Zeta village of Mojanovići.

The defense attorneys of the defendants appealed again against the decision on custody, and the decision has not yet been made.

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