BLACK FRIDAY 13

This is a secret room in which the fall of a powerful mayor began with the conclusion of a deal worth 150 million There was a black risotto on the menu. The other suspects have already arrived, Barišić was late, but a deal has been agreed Writes: Filip Pavić, Rozita Vuković, Dušan MiljušPosted: October 4, 2020 12:45 pm Dražen Barišić Dražen Barišić Black cuttlefish risotto in the Velika Gorica restaurant Mon Ami is widely known. It costs 82 kuna. Whoever tries it once, always comes back. This rule is confirmed by the Mayor of Velika Gorica, Dražen Barišić , the entrepreneur Krešo Petek and the director of VG Vodoopskrba, Tomislav Jelisavac . The three of them have been arranging a job worth almost 150 million kuna in recent months over a plate of black risotto, perhaps with a glass of chardonnay, at the Mon Ami restaurant. The construction of the Goričko wastewater treatment plant, for which they are now under investigation in the Remetinec detention center. Investigators suspect that Barišić "arranged" the city tender for a water purifier for Petek's company Elektrocentar Petek, and that Jelisavac, as the director of the city company, "technically ironed" him. Petek and Barisic are in custody, and Jelisavac was recently released. "Lp, maybe tomorrow Monami, between 12 and 13, risotto," he said on Friday, March 12, with a message to Barisic. "Yes," the mayor replied shortly. This short exchange of SMS confirmed the meeting in the restaurant in Velika Gorica, which became their kind of base. image Restaurant Mon ami Darko Tomas / Cropix The meeting in Mon Ami started a few weeks earlier. However, March 13 was a crucial day, according to investigators, when the "cooperation" and the infernal pact for Petek to get the job was finally concluded. On that Friday the 13th, so that there is no lack of irony, the long-time mayor of Velika Gorica, otherwise a special educator by profession, was in a hurry. He was late. By the way, Barišić is only a few minutes walk to Mon Ami. His office is on the same street, three hundred meters away in the City Hall. The Mon Ami (My Friend) restaurant was not his favorite, as we find out, but it was convenient and close. Petek and Jelisavac always treated Barišić, whom they did not call "my friend", but "boss". Understandably, the first depends on his preference for a project worth 150 million kuna, and the second, according to locals, was installed in the city company VG Vodoopskrba 2018 as a "boss" extension and a "paper signatory". In addition, director Jelisavac and the mayor are neighbors in the nearby Gradići neighborhood, where they both have large family houses. Barišić, as a man of trust, appointed him at the head of Vodoopskrba in order to realize the project of the Velika Gorica Agglomeration, worth a total of HRK 500 million, and includes a new sewerage network and a controversial wastewater treatment plant. 'Scared like a rabbit' Barišić has indebted Jelisavac even before, the people of Velika Gorica tell us. He helped his father Dubravko , the owner of several failed companies, by giving smaller city jobs to his construction company Turopolje gradnja. However, according to the stories, Tomislav Jelisavac did not like the whole situation very well. According to our interlocutors, he sensed that at some point he could "stumble" because of all these documents that he signed for Barišić's combinations. He was a little overwhelmed for Petek's taste as well. "Scared like a rabbit", described him by a powerful businessman from Ivanićgrad. With hidden animosities, the two of them, as many times before, patiently waited for the arrival of Chief Barišić in Mon Ami that Friday the 13th. Investigators recorded the conversation: - Did you call Drazen? Jelisavac Peteka asks nervously. - Yes, if he comes, he says he has a few problems, but he said he would come for five minutes - Petek answers encouragingly. For some reason, Barišić always came to Mon Ami in an official car, a new Mazda 6, even though his office was across the street. The family Mercedes C-Class is driven by his wife Nikolina . image Dražen Barišić with his wife Nikolina Damir Krajac / Cropix Sometime after noon, presumably, he parked in the gravel parking lot of the restaurant. The trio always had their own separate room in the restaurant, investigators found. The only hidden corner in the whole restaurant. The waiters already know the procedure when they see the mayor enter with the company. He directs them to the left up the wooden stairs to a private room with a table for six and off-white chairs. When they serve food and drink, they close the door behind them so that confidential conversations do not leave the four walls. But all these precautions turned out to be in vain. And the walls had ears. image A special room inside the Mon ami restaurant where the arrested Barišić often met with the also arrested Krešo Petek. The repentant in the affair, Tomislav Jelisavac, also attended the meetings Jutarnji List At that time, investigators had been eavesdropping on Petek for half a year, and sometimes physically monitoring him as a suspect in the Janaf affair. This is how the first detail was found out, which was used by the investigators to put together the mosaics of the Velika Gorica set-up. Namely, just after that meeting in Mon Ami, Petek found out that a company had filed an appeal against his offer for a purifier. He immediately starts the showdown. - You complained about Gorica ... purifier (...) What's the matter with you? (...) pull it ... - Petek orders over the phone, investigators noted. Friday the 13th was the beginning of the fall of Barišić, Petek and Jelisavac when investigators suspected that the trio was "cooperating". From telephone conversations, text messages and meetings in Mon Ami, investigators reconstructed over the following months that the tender for the Gorizia purifier was "narithan" to Petek, all culminating in the September arrests. Wisely ‘beating’ services In short, during those four months, until the beginning of July when the bids were finally published, they, with the help of Petek's advisor Mirjana Prodan and Katarina Gašparac , EU project manager at Velika Gorica Water Supply, rewrote the tender conditions and drew references, documentation and responses to complaints for Elektrocentar. Friday. The so-called method. penguins in a public tender, they excluded from the tender elements that other companies had already included in their bids. Thus, Petek's offer in the end was 20 million kuna more favorable than the others (the competitor was Strabag). Friday at meetings in Mon Ami received all the information on how to style his offer. And everything seemed resolved. Offers are out, Friday is the best. The contract, however, was never signed. In mid-September, Jelisavac, the main signatory, was arrested and taken to Remetinac, as were Petek and Barisic. Hrvoje Senegović from the initiative "Velika Gorica without censorship" tells us that this has been the modus operandi of the mayor of Velika Gorica for years, who came to power in 2009. Petek is not the only entrepreneur to whom he has shown affection, although he has worked on more than ten projects in the city in recent years. Among others, the city swimming pool worth 50 million kuna, according to him, is heavily overpaid, and the recycling yard in Kurilovac is worth three million kuna. The Initiative also states that there are suspicions that he employed his wife Nikolina, with an obvious conflict of interest, at the Center for Education in Velika Gorica. image Center for upbringing and education where Barišić's wife Nikolina Barišić works Darko Tomas / Cropix image City pool Velika Gorica Darko Tomas / Cropix And now, appropriately, three residential buildings, urban villas, are springing up on the land next to the Center. One, they claim, should belong to Barišić. All this, according to our interlocutors, allegedly speaks in favor of the fact that the "boss" did not directly take money from the "settings", but the services were wisely "beaten" in different ways. The HDZ itself is talking more and more openly about the mayor of Velika Gorica, his affairs, party progress and lobbying, and larger assets. - I greet the mayor and I am glad that he is still at large - with these words, HDZ member Krešo Hubak greeted his party colleague and the first man of Velika Gorica Dražen Barišić at the annual Assembly of the Fire Brigade six years ago, in 2014. When he heard that, Barišić jumped up from his chair, approached Hubak, who was talking about the financial situation in the Community, and tried to forcibly steal his microphone ... This is an incident that was retold for days in Velika Gorica, and the story was confirmed by I'm Hubak. image Land next to the Center for Education where a new residential building is being built. The Velika Gorica opposition claims that Barisic could become one of the owners of one of the properties in the building Darko Tomas / Cropix - It was just like that, and the cameras recorded it. But I didn't say that for no reason. For years, I collected documentation on Barišić's work and arranged it all into one script, which I called the Velika Gorica White Book. All the sins of Dražen Barišić are listed and documented here - Hubak tells us and adds that the mayor never did anything against him