Social worker Ljiljana Ristić's report on the search for Cvita Miletić — 9 March 2005

Source and dates

This reader presents a complete English translation of the two-page Serbian Cyrillic report signed by social worker Ljiljana Ristić (Љиљана Ристић) in Novi Sad on 9 March 2005. The report concerns Milan Petrović's request of 28 July 2004 to locate his biological mother, Cvita Miletić. Physical PDF pages are identified below. The author's later clarification and analysis appear after the translated report.

Original two-page report

PDF page 1 — Complete translation of the report

SOCIAL WORKER'S REPORT

In the proceedings to locate MILETIĆ CVITA

On the basis of a request submitted on 28 July 2004 by Petrović Milan of Kragujevac, Kraljevački bataljon 110, a search was conducted for his biological mother.

Checks were carried out over an extended period and in several ways, but without a positive result. No information was found indicating the present whereabouts of Miletić Cvita, born on 23 March 1931 in the village of Bila Vlaka in Benkovac, SR Croatia. The following checks were carried out:

• The records of the Secretariat of Internal Affairs (SUP) in Novi Sad list the address Veselina Masleše 42, Novi Sad, where the named person is not present.

• In the Temerin area, her registered address is Žarka Zrenjanina 138. A police patrol checked this address; the people there do not know Cvita.

• At the Centre for Social Work in Temerin, the named person is not registered as a recipient of social protection measures and services.

• The municipal civil registry service in Temerin checked the register of deaths; she is not registered.

• In the records of the civil registrar of the City of Novi Sad from 1 June 1998 to the present, Cvita is not registered as deceased.

• The funeral company “Lisje” in Novi Sad has no information that Cvita was buried in the cemeteries of Novi Sad, Petrovaradin, Sremska Kamenica or Futog.

• A check with the passport service of the SUP in Novi Sad established that Cvita had never held a Serbian travel document.

• Considering that, several years earlier, Cvita had been a recipient of social assistance from the Centre for Social Work in Novi Sad and had exhibited psychologically altered behaviour, a search was also conducted in the psychiatric hospitals in Vršac and Kovin. The named person is not in the records of these hospitals.

• Contact with the SUP in Vršac resulted in a check of the records of residents and deceased persons in the Vršac area. She is not registered. Through the helpfulness of an officer, a check was also made throughout Serbia for persons under the names CVITA and CVETA, but no person of an age similar to Miletić Cvita was found.

• The search also used information that the named person had been in a non-marital relationship with Kojić Čedo. A check with the SUP in Novi Sad found a record that he had died. At his last address, Futoški put 8, there is the “Jugoalat” factory. The factory's personnel service provided information about a person with the same surname. This was a “Jugoalat” pensioner at Cara Dušana 50. Because a new building is being constructed at that address, neighbours provided information that this person's family is in Kovilj. Contact with them established that they are not related to Čedo.

• The address Koste Racina 19, where Cvita and Čedo had previously lived, is also no longer an option, because business premises have been built on that site.

• The pension and disability insurance service checked whether anyone was receiving Čedo's pension after his death, but the answer here was also negative.

• As of today, the person being sought is not at the shelter for adults attached to the Gerontological Centre in Belgrade.

• The last attempt to obtain information from the birth register in Benkovac, where Cvita was born, through the responsible Ministry, was unsuccessful because, since the war in the

PDF page 2 — Continuation and conclusion

territories of the former Republics, information has not been forwarded about persons originating from Bosnia and Herzegovina who are present in Serbia or have died there.

On the basis of the information presented, it can be concluded that further attempts to locate Miletić Cvita exceed the capabilities of this authority. It should also be borne in mind that Cvita was in a very poor psychophysical and socioeconomic condition when she was receiving protection from the Centre for Social Work in Novi Sad. The assessment is that even today she is not in a better condition, which significantly determines the response to her son's request.

It is my opinion that this meeting between the biological mother and the adopted son should not take place and that further searches for Cvita should be discontinued.

Novi Sad, 9 March 2005

SOCIAL WORKER

Ljiljana Ristić

[Signature]

Key wording in the original Cyrillic report

The original wording concerning the date boundary on PDF page 1 is:

„у евиденцији матичара града Н. Сада од 1.6.1998.г. до данас, Цвита није регистрована као умрла“

The original wording of the present-condition assessment and final recommendation on PDF page 2 is:

„Процена је да ни данас није у бољем стању“

„Мишљења сам да до овог сусрета биолошке мајке и усвојеног сина не треба доћи и да даље потраге за Цвитом треба обуставити.“

Later clarification by the author

The author states that his mother, Cvita Miletić, died on 15 June 1997, and that he learned of her death only in 2021. He also states that, in 2021, Damjan Đukić told him at an address in Žarka Zrenjanina Street that Cvita had lived there in 1996–1997 before going to Melenci, where she died. These are the author's later statements, separate from the text signed by Ljiljana Ristić in 2005.

Author's analysis of the report

• The death-register check starts after the reported death. The report expressly limits the Novi Sad death-register check to the period from 1 June 1998 onwards. That period does not include 15 June 1997, the date of his mother's death stated by the author. The result of that limited check cannot answer whether she died in 1997. The report does not mention a check in Melenci.

• A present-condition assessment is made without locating Cvita. After reporting that her whereabouts could not be established, the social worker nevertheless assesses that “even today she is not in a better condition”. No dated contemporary examination or identified current source for that assessment is provided in the report.

• The ending denies the meeting and calls for the search to stop. It does more than report an unsuccessful search: Ljiljana Ristić expressly states that the meeting between mother and son should not take place and that further searches should be discontinued. The author regards this ending as an arrogant withholding of information and obstruction of his search for his mother.

• The geographical explanation contradicts the report's own opening. The opening places Cvita's birthplace, Bila Vlaka in Benkovac, in SR Croatia. The explanation continuing onto page 2 refers instead to persons originating from Bosnia and Herzegovina. This is a mismatch within the same report; the report does not literally say that Benkovac is in Bosnia and Herzegovina.