Bosnian Immigrant Sentenced to 5 Years For Hiding Role in Srebrenica Massacre

BOSTON — A Bosnian immigrant was sentenced to more than five years in prison yesterday for concealing his role in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre so that he could get into America.

Marko Boskic, 41, who prosecutors believe may have been personally responsible for killing 100 people, was sentenced to five years and three months. He was convicted over the summer of hiding his military service on his immigration applications.

Authorities say he will probably face deportation to Bosnia after he serves his sentence.

Boskic's attorney complained that the government was trying to punish his client for participating in the Srebrenica killings — a crime he is not charged with and one he claims he committed after he was threatened with death himself.

Prosecutors said Boskic acknowledged he was a soldier in a Bosnian Serb military unit and helped execute 1,200 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, where some 8,000 Bosnian Muslims were killed. It was the largest massacre in Europe since World War II.

Boskic was living in Peabody and working construction jobs when he was arrested in 2004.