Forensic Findings Form a Secret Cemetery in Tirana, Albania

197 DOCUMENTATION Osteological proofs of torture and cruelty: forensic findings form a secret cemetery in Tirana, Albania Admir Sinamati, MD*, Anila Tahiri, MD**, Besim Ymaj, MD***, Zija Ismaili***, Gentian Vyshka, MD****, Bardhyl Çipi, MD**** Abstract usually by bullet shot in the posterior region of Two decades after the fall of the communism in the skull. Albania, documenting the human rights violations and proving torture and cruelties suffered from Keywords: Secret cemetery, mass graves, identifica- ex-politically persecuted and dissidents of the tion, human rights violations, torture, communism. regime, is still a societal priority. Due to several reasons, the judicial way toward redressing the Introduction historical injustices has been slowed down. This is Identification of human remains in mass mainly because of the lack of proper documenta- graves is a very important step toward docu- tion of torture, mass executions and extrajudicial menting human rights violations and giving ill-treatment. Several governmental and civil so- back to families the human remains of vic- ciety organizations have tried to define the issue, tims, that are considered, until exhumed, as but perpetrators have rarely, if ever, been brought to court. Secret cemeteries and mass graves have lost or disappeared, mainly due to extrajudi- recently been found in different zones of Albania, cial executions. The importance of redress- and victims exhumed; thus proofs of torture and ing the injustices and bringing to justice ill-treatments are being made widely known, po- perpetrators, who will therefore lose their tentially creating the necessary legal conditions impunity, cannot be underemphasized even for punishing the perpetrators and for identifying for very remote crimes. For example, the victims. In the present paper, authors describe identification process of human skeletal re- osteological forensic findings from Linza secret mains exhumed from mass graves has taken cemetery in Tirana, where several ante mortem place in Spain, more than 50 years after the fractures prove the severe and cruel ill-treatment Spanish Civil War.1 the victims suffered before the execution that was In addition, mass grave excavations have T ORTURE gradually become an integral and very important part in the preparation of judicial 21, Number 3, 2011 Volume *) Institute of Forensic Medicine, Tirana, Albania. Mem- files, and in accomplishing the hard task ber of the Task Force for the identification of disappeared of defending them before the courts. Thus, persons of the communist regime. general opinion regarding the uncontestable **) Forensic Anthropology, School of History, Classics crimes perpetrated during the Nazi regime, and Archaeology, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. or during numerous communist dictator- ships, would have been judicially insufficient ***) Institute of Forensic Medicine, Tirana, Albania. for condemning responsible executioners, ****) Faculty of Medicine, University of Tirana. unless pictures, photos and documentation 198 DOCUMENTATION of suffering had been available. Availability Apart from discrepancies in the pub- of proof of torture and cruelty several years lished figures, communism in Albania has or decades after their perpetration can be perpetrated panoply of human rights viola- scarce, and memories of survivors, in writ- tions, partially documented and partially ten or in verbal forms, rarely will suffice for not, among which mass murder and poli- a court to pronounce unappealable verdicts. ticide are the most important and severe. Although excavating mass graves serves In defining the term politicide, Rummel primarily for the identification process and included the premeditated killing or murder for helping relatives to find remnants of lost of any person or people by a government persons, ensuring evidence from mass grave for political purposes.7 Mass murders were excavations is becoming a successful way to common in Albania in the period immedi- get war criminals convicted, like in Guate- ately after WWII, especially during punishing mala (Dos Erres Case) and in Bosnia (Krsti´c expeditions in Northern areas of the country case, Srebrenica massacre).2,3 and neighboring ex-Yugoslavia where the Even though, politically the communist anticommunist resistance was fierce and regime in Albania has been widely and al- prolonged. Mass graves and secret cemeter- most unanimously condemned, perpetrators ies are not intended only for the idea of of crimes, such as of torture in its different punishing expeditions, but also because for forms, mainly enacted from officials of se- the Albanian secret police and law enforce- cret services of the totalitarian state, never ment agencies of the communist period, the served any sentence that explicitly redressed option of not returning corpses of executed the wrongdoings of the past. Inability to un- persons to the respective families was widely cover the smoking gun in alleged crimes and practiced. political assassinations was not because of the lack of political will, but rather because Description of the secret cemetery of the lack of professionalism in gathering at Linza, Tirana evidence and in conducting judicial maneu- Linza is a small place several kilometers vers. Even official data of missing persons from Tirana, east of the capital and at the and of imprisoned or executed victims (both foot of the mountain Dajti, which forms the judicially and extrajudicially) are full of gaps, natural eastern boundary of the city. The and non-governmental organizations gener- finding of a secret cemetery was not merely ally offer different figures while engaged coincidental, since inhabitants of the zone in advocacy for the politically persecuted were aware for years that certain hidden ar- families. There is discrepancy in the data eas of a bushy and hilly zone were used for in recent publications; thus the total figure burying individuals executed from commu- of executed persons during the communist nist secret police. Relatives of the executed regime is considered to be 4,548 individu- persons were digging the ground trying to als from one source4 and 6,007 individuals find remains of their lost beloved ones, and according to another source.5 The figures of in February, 2010, human skeletons were lo- imprisoned and internally displaced persons cated; the fact received wide media coverage differ even more.4,5 A thorough description and public interest.8 Experts from the Tirana Volume 21, Number 3, 2011 Volume of methods of torture and periods of politi- Prosecution Office and from the Institute of cal persecution in Albania is available in Legal Medicine were called to the premises ORTURE 6 T English as well. only after the diggings of the relatives gave 199 DOCUMENTATION the first results, thus the process of exhuma- Results tion was not professionally organized, as The totals of thirteen plastic bags contain- described in the Minnesota Protocol.9 The ing human remains were examined by the crime scene examination took place thereaf- forensic experts in Tirana. Bones and clothes ter, while the exhumed remains were already were found together with the plants and soil transferred to Tirana. The identifying team from the area. Clothes were preserved for acknowledged the presence of a secret cem- the forthcoming identification process. etery, since 13 skeletons had been found, In general, the skeletal remains, both buried in several pits, distancing five meters cranial and non-cranial elements, were in from each other. The area could be reached a poor to moderate preservation condition. only by foot; four-wheel machines were able There was no soft tissue present. Some to stand by in a distance of 150 meters. The bones were characterized by surface ero- pathway was blocked to common people sion and postmortem fractures. Some of the until 1990, since it was considered through bones were missing and some of them were appropriate signs a “military area”. completely fragmented to such a degree that The exhumed skeletons were examined examination was impossible. Some parts of only after they were sent to the Institute of the pelvis were missing, making it difficult Forensic Medicine in Tirana. In the latter a to determine sex. General condition of the thorough osteological study was performed. bones indicates the taphonomic changes The main feature, common to all skeletons, that the skeleton underwent during burial. was the fact that all victims (100%) had From thirteen skulls, most of them were perimortal lesions in the skull; bullet-shoot fragmented with a few bones available for wounds in the skull or fractures caused by the reconstruction and further analysis. blunt force trauma. i.e. characteristics of mass From all thirteen skeletons, one was killings which are also reported in other mass considered to be female; the study of pel- grave exhumations, such as the Tuskulënai vis and cranium indicated that the other case in Lithuania.10 All skeleton remains, skeletons were males apart from one where during the exhumation and during forensic- sex determination was inconclusive. Stature anthropological evaluation in the laboratory, was estimated through formulas based on were photographed and stored into a WORM the maximum length of femur, according medium, as has been suggested.11 to a method which has been suggested by The definition of mass grave and secret several authors. The method has been vali- cemetery varies depending on the point of dated recently in a Portuguese sample.14-16 When a femur

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