PROF. GROOME SPEAKS TO THE KUPFERSCHMID HOLOCAUST-HUMAN RIGHTS PROJECT AT BOSTON COLLEGE LAW SCHOOL
February 2021 — On February 24, 2021, Professor Dermot Groome gave a presentation to the Kupferschmid Holocaust/Human Rights Project at Boston College Law School. His presentation, Genocide and International Justice, summarized the law of Genocide and addressed the international community’s growing complacency towards accountability mechanisms for atrocity crimes.
In delivering his remarks, Groome drew from his experience leading the investigation and prosecution of the genocide cases against Slobodan Milošević, the President of Serbia, and General Ratko Mladić, the commander of the Bosnian Serb Army. The Owen M. Kupferschmid Holocaust/Human Rights Project (HHRP), “aims to ensure that Holocaust-related law is fully realized and applied to state-sponsored human rights violations today.” The HHRP invited Professor Groome to address them on the issue of genocide and his experience leading the investigation and prosecution of the genocide cases against Slobodan Milošević and General Ratko Mladić. These cases involved the persecutory and genocidal campaigns waged against Bosnian Muslims during the breakup of Yugoslavia between 1992 and 1995. Groome’s indictment of Milošević marked the first time in history a head of state was charged with the crime of genocide.
Groome also addressed atrocity crimes currently being perpetrated against the Uyghur population in China and the Rohingya in Myanmar.
The HHRP has made a recording of Prof. Groome’s presentation available to the public.
Professor Dermot Groome is a Professor of Law and the Harvey A. Feldman Distinguished Faculty Scholar at Penn State Dickinson Law. Much of his teaching, scholarship, and service focus on emerging areas of human rights and international criminal law and draw upon his deep expertise and experiences. After starting his career in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office where he was a member of the Sex Crimes Unit and after working in Jamaica, W.I. on issues of community development, human rights, and children’s rights, Professor Groome worked in Cambodia. While in Cambodia, he served as a Legal Advisor to the International Human Rights Law Group, helped lead an investigation into a 1997 attack on peaceful protestors and drafted a report for the UN Security Council, helped the Cambodia Defender’s Project and Legal Aid of Cambodia investigate deaths in police custody, worked on issues related to the incarceration of children, and wrote a draft juvenile criminal procedure code. Professor Groome subsequently spent over 11 years as a senior war crimes prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. He investigated and drafted the first genocide indictment against a sitting head of state, Slobodan Milošević, and was the Senior Trial Attorney for the Bosnia indictment. In total, Groome led the prosecution of five international criminal trials including the case against Ratko Mladić, who was convicted of genocide for the murder of over 7,000 men and boys in Srebrenica in 1995. He led eight large complex international investigations of senior military, political, and police officials. Groome’s cases all included crimes of sexual violence against women, men, and children. He was instrumental in the development of Joint Criminal Enterprise, a theory of criminal responsibility often used to assess the culpability of senior officials for the crimes committed by their subordinates. Two documentaries have been made about Professor Groome’s cases: The Trial of Ratko Mladić (PBS/Frontline 2019) and Crimes Before the ICTY: Višegrad (UN TV 2017).