Zoran Marjanovic Beaten in Palilula, Held in Hospital
Unofficial media reports say the man on trial for his wife's murder was hurt in a fight with a friend. Police and prosecutors have issued no statement, and his trial resumes in four days.
Zoran Marjanovic, on trial for the murder of his wife Jelena Marjanovic, was reportedly beaten around three in the morning on the night of October 2 to 3, 2026, in a flat in Palilula, Belgrade. He was kept in hospital with a brain contusion. As of the morning of October 3, neither police nor prosecutors had issued a statement, so everything in this article rests on unofficial media reports.
What happened in the Palilula flat?
Blic was the first to publish details of the argument and the blows with a pistol, and Nova, Mondo, Srbija Danas and other outlets picked them up. Kurir says it was the first to report that Marjanovic had been beaten at all.
According to those reports, Marjanovic reported the incident to police himself. He told them he had been in the flat with a friend, that the two had argued and that the argument turned physical. By the same accounts, the friend hit him in the head with a pistol several times. None of this has been confirmed officially.
What is known about the injuries and the hospital admission?
He was admitted to hospital at about 3:30 a.m. The media do not name the medical facility. According to published reports, doctors found injuries to his head and body and a contusion of the brain, treated the injuries and prescribed therapy. Because of the severity of the injuries, he stayed in hospital for treatment.
An unnamed Kurir source described the time of admission and the condition he arrived in, and Mondo and Novosti carried the statement as well:
Zoran was admitted around half past three this morning. He was extremely upset, furious and angry. He had injuries to his head and body. He was examined and given a prescription for therapy.
The source has not been named, so the statement cannot be verified. The other reports that mention the admission time give the same figure, about half past three.
Who is the attacker, and has anyone been detained?
The identity of the friend who allegedly hit Marjanovic has not been published. There is also no information that anyone has been detained or arrested.
In their first versions, Kurir, Mondo and Novosti wrote that the circumstances of the incident and those involved in the attack were not yet known. The details about the argument and the pistol came later, attributed to Blic.
The trial resumes on October 7
Marjanovic is being retried at the Higher Court in Belgrade for the aggravated murder of his wife, the singer Jelena Marjanovic, who was killed on April 2, 2016. He has denied guilt since the start of the proceedings.
The first-instance verdict, which sentenced him to 40 years in prison, was overturned by the Court of Appeals. The same court lifted his detention on October 3, 2023, and he has been defending himself from freedom since. The reports of the attack surfaced exactly three years to the day after that decision.
The next hearing is scheduled for October 7, 2026. The previous one was postponed because of technical problems playing surveillance camera footage from the day of the killing, and the expert witness proposed that all recordings be reviewed at the next hearing. The published reports say nothing about whether the injuries will affect the hearing going ahead.
