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On January 27, 2015, the Court of General Jurisdiction of Arabkir and Kanaker-Zeytun administrative districts of Yerevan city, RA, presided by judge L. Avetisyan, resumed the court trial on the criminal case initiated on the death of 2-year-old Lia Misakyan against Lilit Vardanyan and Zarine Ayvazyan. Note that at the previous hearing on this case, Yerem Sargsyan, defendant Zarine Ayvazyan’s advocate, petitioned to postpone the hearing to provide reasonable time to compare the data supplied by the questioned forensic expert S. Sevoyan against the other expert opinions and to file a potential petition for assigning an expert commission re-examination.

At the court hearing of January 27, 2015, advocate Y. Sargsyan stated that despite the fact that the expert opinions were obviously groundless and deeply flawed, they contained no deficiencies in terms of his client, and therefore, the defense considered it unnecessary to file a motion on re-examination.

Givi Hovhannisyan, advocate of the other defendant Lilit Vardanyan, presented to the Court the responses to his inquiries to the ‘Arabkir’ Medical Center, some criteria approved by the RA Ministry of Health and the professional opinion of Professor A. Sargsyan, Head of the Pediatric Service at ‘Arabkir’ Medical Center, Head of No. 2 Pediatrics Chair at the Yerevan State Medical University, on the expert opinions of expert examination under the criminal case in question. The advocate asked the Court to attach the documents above as evidence to the case file.

Neither Y. Sargsyan, Zarine Ayvazyan’s advocate, nor Prosecutor D. Karapetyan objected to attaching the submitted documents to the case. Artur Sakunts, representative of the successor to the victim, objected to attaching to the case the response of ‘Arabkir’ Medical Center and A. Sargsyan’s professional opinion. In particular, A. Sakunts noted that the inquiry responses filed to the Court by G. Hovhannisyan were provided by the medical center where the defendants worked and the incident occurred, therefore, such responses could not prove objective. Also, no other evidence in support of the information in the response letters was submitted to the Court. As for the opinion provided by the employee of the medical center in question, it could not be considered as evidence, since such opinions might be issued by experts only.

In his response to the objection of A. Sakunts, G. Hovhannisyan stated that the Court did not require any evidence in support of the inquiries, and if such data cast any doubt, the aggrieved party might, on its own initiative, turn to ‘Arabkir’ Medical Center for necessary information. G. Hovhannisyan also mentioned that Professor A. Sargsyan, Head of the Pediatric Service at ‘Arabkir’ Medical Center, Head of No. 2 Pediatrics Chair at the Yerevan State Medical University gave a professional opinion rather than an expert one.

Upon considering the motion, the Court considered it reasonable and upheld it by attaching to the case the documents supplied by G. Hovhannisyan.

 Sakunts, representative of Georgi Misakyan, successor to the victim, mentioned that the Court was not objective and took a biased attitude based on the fact that it rejected to attach to the case the video of the aggrieved party made by G. Misakyan.

In his response, the presiding judge L. Avetisyan said that the video might not be viewed as evidence in the case, and in its motion, the aggrieved party petitioned to attach it to the case as evidence, whereas in his motion to the Court G. Hovhannisyan petitioned to attach to the case the official letters submitted to the Court as documents.

Then A. Sakunts petitioned the court to attach the video to the case file as a document. Prosecutor D. Karapetyan cited the clause of Article 122 of the RA Criminal Procedure Code, stating that any verbal, numeric, graphic or other symbolic record on paper, magnetic, electronic or other medium contributing to establishing data of any significance for the criminal case was considered a document and asked the Court to meet the motion.

The defense did not object to the motion in question. Upon considering the motion of A. Sakunts, the Court decided to uphold it; however, since the video could not be presented to the court at the moment, the issue was postponed till its delivery.

Thereafter, the Court stated that the trial examination of the case was completed and passed to the court debates.

Prosecutor D. Karapetyan, asked the Court for a reasonable terms to prepare his speech, and the Parties to trial upheld his motion.

Thus, the court hearing was postponed till 10:30 am February 24, 2015.