5.  The applicant was born in 1962 and lives in Bečej, where he was employed as a police officer.
6.  On 24 January 2003 the Bečej Municipal Court (“the Municipal Court”) started judicial investigation proceedings against the applicant for the alleged commission of a number of criminal offences concerning the performance of his duties.
7.  On 26 May 2003 the competent directorate of the Ministry of Interior dismissed the applicant from the police force (effective as of 30 May 2003). The decision noted that the criminal proceedings had been instituted against the applicant and that Article 45, in conjunction with Article 34 (1)(2), of the Ministry of Interior Act 1991, which was in force at the time of the dismissal, should be applied. According to this provision a police officer could be dismissed, at the discretion of the Ministry of Interior, if he no longer met the requirements for being a police officer, which included the requirement that criminal proceedings of a particular type should not be pending against him. The applicant lodged an appeal against this decision, but on 30 June 2003 his appeal was rejected and the dismissal thus confirmed.
8.  On 23 July 2003 the applicant lodged a claim with the Municipal Court seeking his reinstatement.
9.  On 31 October 2003 the Municipal Court partly discontinued the criminal proceedings against the applicant based on the applicable procedural prescription period.
10.  On 12 November 2003 the remainder of the criminal proceedings were discontinued because the public prosecutor had withdrawn the charges.
11.  On 30 December 2003 the Municipal Court annulled the decision on the applicant’s dismissal of 26 May 2003 by partial judgment, establishing that everyone charged with a criminal offence should be presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law, and that a broad interpretation of Article 45 of the Ministry of Interior Act 1991 in regards to the persons who were not found guilty could be only to their detriment.
12.  On 17 June 2004 the Novi Sad District Court (“the District Court”) upheld this judgment. The applicant’s former employer thereafter submitted an appeal on points of law.
13.  In the meantime, the applicant was reinstated to his previous post by decision of the Ministry of Interior of 13 January 2005. The decisions of 26 May and 30 June 2003 were also repealed.
14.  On 9 March 2005, however, the Supreme Court upheld the appeal on points of law, reversed the judgments of 30 December 2003 and 17 June 2004 and rejected the applicant’s claim for reinstatement. It found that the dismissal of 26 May 2006 had been in accordance with the Article 45, read in conjunction with Article 34 (1)(2) of the Ministry of Interior Act 1991, and that the mere fact that the criminal proceedings had been pending against the applicant was sufficient reason for the applicant’s dismissal.
15.  On 4 July 2005 the applicant was thus again dismissed from his job, which decision was upheld on 11 August 2005 by the Minister of Interior.
16.  On 4 August 2005, the applicant brought another set of the proceedings for the annulment of his second dismissal. However, the Municipal Court, the District Court and the Supreme Court, by their judgments of 27 October 2005, 10 May 2007 and 18 December 2007, respectively, all ruled against him and upheld his dismissal on the basis of Article 45, read in conjunction with Article 34 (1)(2), of the Ministry of Interior Act 1991.
17.  On 14 March 2008 the applicant lodged an appeal with the Constitutional Court concerning the outcome, fairness and the length of the civil proceedings concerning his dismissal, the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty and the “right to work”.
18.  On 17 February 2011 the Constitutional Court rejected the applicant’s appeal. In regards to the court judgments of 31 October 2003, 17 June 2004 and 9 March 2005 the Constitutional Court established that the his complaints were inadmissible ratione temporis given that the Serbian Constitution had come into force on 8 November 2006, i.e. after the first set of the proceedings concerning the applicant’s dismissal. On the other hand, with respect to the judgments of 27 October 2005, 10 May and 18 December 2007, the Constitutional Court found that they were not arbitrary, and upheld the legality of the applicant’s second dismissal on the basis of Article 45, read in conjunction with Article 34 (1)(2), of the Ministry of Interior Act 1991. In the Constitutional Court’s view, the fact that the applicant was ultimately dismissed on 4 July 2005, instead of on 26 May 2003, was only in the applicant’s favour, and that fact alone could not affect the legality of his “dismissal as such”.
19.  Before this on 19 January 2011, the Constitutional Court rendered a decision in the case of Stefanović v. Serbia (UŽ 753/2008), concerning the same legal issue in which it ruled in favour of the appelant in that case (see Milojević and Others v. Serbia, nos. 43519/07 and 2 others, §§ 36-37, 12 January 2016).