Starting v. Sofija Bogosavljev

Sofija Bogosavljev (Journalist)

KRIK

Completed. On December 3, the company “Starting” withdrew the lawsuit it had previously filed against KRIK journalist Sofija Bogosavljev. Thus, the trial that was conducted against Bogosavljev ended. A day earlier, the company “Starting” submitted to the court a document on the withdrawal of the criminal complaint it filed against KRIK journalist Sofija Bogosavljev. The company’s lawyers did not appear at the hearing scheduled for December 3, and judge Sonja Kusturić delivered an acquittal in favor of the journalist.

Previous course of the trial: The trial before the First Court in Belgrade began on October 9, 2025, because the mediation failed. Namely, as a condition for withdrawing the lawsuit, Starting demanded that KRIK publicly apologize, which this research portal refused. At the trial, a new person – Mališa Nedeljković – appeared instead of Nikola Trivić, the director of the company until recently. The next hearing is scheduled for December 3.
The hearing scheduled for July 21 was postponed because one of the co-owners of that company, Nikola Trivić, did not appear. The criminal case against the journalist will be dismissed if Trivić does not appear at the next scheduled hearing, said judge Sonja Kusturić. By the way, the Public Prosecutor’s Office for Organized Crime is conducting an investigation against Nikola Trivić related to corruption in the reconstruction project of the Serbian railway and the Railway Station in Novi Sad.

1. With the lawsuit that initiated the procedure, the plaintiff uses an imbalance of power, such as his financial advantage, political/social influence or authority as a power holder, in which way he puts pressure on the defendant – an actor participating in the public debate.

The plaintiff is a company that generates multimillion revenues and is engaged in numerous public projects.

2. The arguments presented by the prosecutor are partially or completely unfounded.

The plaintiff alleges that their business reputation was damaged due to the publication of information from official, official documents about the proceedings that were conducted against them and due to the injury of their workers at unsecured construction sites.

3. The lawsuit or legal remedy, that is, the request or proposal submitted by the plaintiff is disproportionate, excessive or unreasonable.

The plaintiff demands that the journalist be fined 300,000 dinars, which is excessive considering that it is an unfounded lawsuit.

4. The lawsuit was filed against (i) an individual, i.e. a responsible media editor and/or a journalist and not (only) against an organization that organized the disputed activity, i.e. a media publisher and/or a journalist who published the news within a public debate.

The lawsuit was filed against the KRIK journalist, which represents additional pressure on the individual and exhausting the journalist’s material and psychological resources. Since it is a criminal proceeding, it obligates the journalist to attend hearings, forcing her to focus her time and attention on the lengthy and exhausting trial process instead of pursuing the journalism profession, which is one of the purposes of SLAPP lawsuits.

5. The plaintiff, or persons related to the plaintiff, in the previous period were or are now participants in multiple and coordinated filing of lawsuits against actors participating in the public debate.

The plaintiff filed a total of seven lawsuits against various actors: journalists, lawyers, engineers and others who publicly criticized the work of this company.

6. The prosecutor did not initiate out-of-court mechanisms for resolving the disputed matter before filing the lawsuit, or the prosecutor, as a holder of public authority, did not issue a warning or admonishment to the defendant but immediately filed the lawsuit.

It is not known that the plaintiff initiated extrajudicial mechanisms for resolving the disputed matter. The automatic filing of a lawsuit is intended to surprise the defendant and force them to redirect all their activities and resources to dealing with the court process.

7. The plaintiff uses procedural options aimed at increasing the costs of the procedure, e.g. postponement of hearings, non-attendance of witnesses or experts, as well as directing cases to be decided by eligible judges, as well as appointing biased experts, which significantly complicates the procedural position and reduces the chances of the defendant’s success in the proceedings.

The prosecutor did not appear at the first scheduled hearing.