The parents of a teenage boy who shot nine dead in a Belgrade school were today sentenced to 14 and 12 years in prison, after a retrial that British legal experts have described as a landmark for victims’ rights. The case, which has gripped Serbia and drawn international attention, saw the father and mother convicted of criminal neglect for failing to secure the firearms their son used in the 2023 attack. Labour MPs in Britain say the verdict sends a powerful message to gun owners everywhere: that lax storage can lead to jail time.
For the parents of the murdered children, it is a small measure of justice after months of delays and a first trial that collapsed on a technicality. The retrial, held under tighter security in Belgrade’s High Court, heard harrowing evidence from survivors and the families of the dead, including a mother from a working-class area of Novi Sad who spoke of her daughter’s final moments. British barristers, some of whom observed the proceedings under an exchange programme with the Serbian Bar Association, praised the court’s thoroughness.
“This is not revenge. It is accountability for the simple, brutal fact that those guns should never have been accessible to a troubled child,” said one London-based QC who specialises in corporate manslaughter. The father, a former army reservist, had claimed the weapons were locked away.
But prosecutors proved the lock was broken months before the massacre. The mother, who was at work during the attack, was found to have ignored warning signs. The judge noted their son had been receiving psychiatric treatment and had posted disturbing messages online.
The sentencing comes as Serbia grapples with a wave of school shootings and a deep cultural attachment to firearms. For Britain, where gun laws are among the strictest in the world, the case has reignited a debate about parental responsibility. Unions representing teachers and school support staff say the ruling should prompt a review of how schools in England share information with parents about children at risk.
“The state cannot watch every home. But a conviction like this tells every parent: if you leave a loaded weapon where a child can reach it, you face prison,” said a spokesperson for the National Education Union. At the kitchen table, though, the impact is felt differently.
In towns like Stoke-on-Trent and Sunderland, where gun crime is rare but knife violence is a daily fear, the case seems distant. But for those who have lost children to violence, it resonates. “We fought for years to get the law changed after our son was stabbed.
This Serbian case shows that parents can be held accountable. Why not here?” asked a woman whose son was killed in a gang attack in Manchester three years ago.
She spoke to me outside a community centre, her eyes tired but her voice steady. The Serbian verdict will not bring back the nine children and the security guard who died that May morning. But it may force a conversation about where responsibility truly lies.
And for the grieving families in Belgrade, that is the closest thing to closure they will ever get.
