Year of Call: 1985
Year of Silk: 2009
David Josse QC joined Chambers in July 2010 having spent five years at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. David specialises in both Extradition and International Criminal Law. He is available to advise and lead in all aspects of extradition. His recent work has tended to involve requests of a political nature by states from the East of Europe. In these cases he has combined his specialist knowledge of such countries derived from his first degree in Russian and Soviet history with his work at the ICTY in cases that required a detailed understanding and analysis of a state in transition following the collapse of communism.
In addition to extradition he has a wealth of experience of general criminal work, gleaned from 20 years practice at the junior bar As such he has defended and prosecuted in serious violent and sexual crime, drugs (in particular large scale importations) and fraud work. He is presently instructed in a number of murders.
In his years at the ICTY David worked full time as counsel on two high profile trials. In these he was engaged in both the oral and written advocacy.
Prosecutor v. Krajisnik (2005-2006)
Momcilo Krajisnik is most senior politician whose trial has reached completion at the ICTY. He was a member of the Bosnian Serb leadership during the Bosnian civil war (1992-1995). In essence it was alleged that he was the second most powerful and influential Serb politician in the Republika Srpska after Radovan Karadzic and that the two of them ran their self-proclaimed state in tandem. The indictment dealt with crimes committed throughout much of 1992 in 37 of the 109 municipalities of Bosnia-Herzegovina. In order to put the events of 1992 into context, the case dealt extensively with the political events in Bosnia from the advent of the multi-party system in 1990 to the outbreak of the war in Spring 1992, when the crimes alleged began to take place. The trial transcript ultimately amounted to in excess of 27,000 pages. Krajisnik was acquitted of genocide, but was convicted of various crimes the most significant of which being extermination, murder (of approximately 3000 persons) and persecutions. Some of these convictions including extermination and murder were in turn quashed on appeal.
Prosecutor v. Popovic et al (2006-2010)
David Josse represented the defendant Milan Gvero in this seven defendant case. He was the principal advocate in his team. The trial was the largest war crimes trial in terms of the number of accused persons since Nuremberg. The case involved the events surrounding the Srebrenica massacre in July 1995, the worst massacre in Europe since the Second World War, where approximately 8,000 Muslim men were allegedly murdered by soldiers from the Bosnian Serb army. Gvero faced charges of murder, persecutions, forcible transfer and deportation. He is the most senior officer yet to stand trial for events surrounding the Srebrenica massacre having been a Lieutenant General at the material time. In June 2010 he was acquitted of a number of the charges including murder and received a sentence of only 5 years imprisonment which resulted in his immediate release for time served.
The Prosecution have appealed this result and David continues to act for Gvero in the on-going appellate proceedings.
David Josse remains involved in International Criminal and Humanitarian Law in various ways and as such is on the List of Counsel at both the International Criminal Court and the Special Tribunal for the Lebanon.
David is available to lecture and conduct seminars both in relation to his experiences of international war crime trials as well as in connection with domestic extradition law.
