The image is for representation purposes only.
Belgrade: A 21-year-old man was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Thursday after being found guilty in a Serbian court of killing nine people in a mass shooting.
Uros Blazic shot his victims, the youngest of whom was 14 years old, on May 4 last year in the villages of Dubona and Malo Orasje, about 50 kilometers (32 miles) from Belgrade.
Twelve others were injured in the shooting, which came just a day after a 13-year-old student killed nine of his classmates and a security guard at his school in the center of the capital.
The back-to-back shootings shocked Serbs and led President Aleksandar Vucic to vow to launch a large-scale disarmament plan to remove hundreds of thousands of weapons from the country.
Blazic was sentenced to a maximum sentence of 20 years in a summary trial because he was under 21 at the time of the crime, angering the victims' families.
Had he been older, he would have faced life in prison.
The lawyer for the victims' families, Stefan Stefanovic, said he was satisfied that Blazic received the maximum sentence, but not its length.
“The families were not given full justice. “What else needs to happen for the executive and legislative branches to change the law?” Stefanovic said.
The attacker's father, Radisa Blazic, was also sentenced to 20 years in prison after being found guilty of illegal possession of firearms.
The prosecutor accused him of “creating the conditions for the crime” by purchasing the gun used in the massacre and other firearms found in their home.
Blazic's trial – at a high-security court normally reserved for organized crime and war crimes cases – was completed in four months, a record for the Serbian justice system.
It was postponed after outbursts from family members of his victims.
Blazic said in his closing statement to the court: “These are despicable acts that I have committed. I deserve the harshest punishment.”
“All I can say is that I am guilty and willing to face the consequences.”
