A year and a half after the Puls fire, trial continues with no convictions

A year and a half after the nightclub fire that shocked the country, parents of the victims continue to demand justice while the criminal trial moves slowly and no one has yet been convicted.

The first accused in the case, Dejan Jovanov Deko, has been the subject of a separate legal development: prosecutors opened a new criminal investigation against him shortly before the statutory deadline for his detention in the Puls fire case. That step produced a fresh 30-day pretrial detention order, but this time he was placed in the remand facility in Shutka rather than Kumanovo. Several other suspects in the case have also seen changes in their custody status, with court options including house arrest under consideration.

Prosecutors from the Public Prosecutor's Office for Prosecution of Organized Crime and Corruption say the new probe concerns suspicions that Jovanov offered a bribe to an official at the Ministry of Economy to secure a catering license for a venue he knew did not meet legal requirements, and that the detention proposal was filed because of a flight risk.

Legal experts and family pressure

Legal scholar Gordan Kalajdzhiev criticized the timing of the new investigation, arguing that opening a fresh case merely to extend detention amounts to an abuse of the legal process. He urged the court to reject such procedural moves if the rule of law is to be respected. "Opening an artificially new investigation just to circumvent the law is an abuse of the law! Prosecutors should have thought about deadlines when they charged whoever they could in the fire case! The court should reject that proposal if there is a rule of law!" he said.

The Pulse fire began on 16 March last year during a performance by the band DNK. In the catastrophe 63 people lost their lives and more than 200 were injured. Families of the victims have held marches and public actions demanding accountability as the proceedings continue without final convictions.

With trial hearings still underway and new procedural moves unfolding, relatives and legal observers warn that the path to final verdicts is likely to remain slow and contested as the court evaluates new charges and custody requests.

Photo: press material from the event