Authorities responsible for the proceedings did not attend examination of appeal on Hayk Movsisyan’s case
11:01, August 24, 2015 | News, Own newsOn August 3, 2015, the General Jurisdiction Court of the Kentron and Nork-Marash administrative districts, Yerevan city, RA, presided by Judge M. Makyan, initiated the examination of the appeal filed by Artur Sakunts and Arayik Zalyan, representatives of Hayk Movsisyan’s mother Heghine Petrosyan. Note that by Decree of February 27, 2015, the RA Court of Cassation had upheld the appeal filed by A. Sakunts and A. Zalyan and stated that the lower courts wrongly concluded that H. Petrosyan’s representatives had violated the procedural order for appealing the actions (inaction) by the agencies responsible for preliminary investigation on declaring her a party to the trial. Thus, the RA Court of Cassation reversed the rulings on dismissing the appeal of A. Sakunts and A. Zalyan by the General Jurisdiction Court of First Instance of Kentron and Nork-Marash administrative districts, Yerevan city, RA and the RA Court of Appeal and sent the case to the court of first instance for a new trial. The examination of the appeal on August 3, 2015 was attended only by H. Petrosyan’s representative A. Sakunts. As for the agencies responsible for the proceedings, in particular, M. Babayan, Deputy Head of the RA Special Investigation Service and V. Badaylan, Senior Public Prosecutor at the RA Public Prosecutor’s Office, did not attend the court hearing. Instead, they submitted to the court letters stating that due to their heavy workload, they could not attend the hearing and asking the court to examine the appeal in their absence. Meanwhile, both M. Babayan and V. Badalyan found that the appeal should be rejected. V. Badalyan also submitted to the court the documents related to the appeal. The appellant’s representative A. Sakunts noted that he considered it compulsory for the agencies responsible for the proceedings to attend the examination of the appeal since the case in question concerned violation of H. Movsisyan’s right to life and requested the copies of both the letters submitted to the Court and the materials. The Presiding Judge M. Makyan decided to adjourn the hearing, so that the appellant’s representative might get familiar with the materials submitted to the court by V. Badalayn. The Court also noted that under Article 290 of the RA Criminal Procedure Code, it was the court to decide on whether the presence of the applicant or the agency responsible for the proceedings was compulsory and added that the issue of such a necessity will be considered upon presentation of the appeal. The examination of the appeal will proceed on August 20, 2015, at 10:30 am. Note that H. Movsisyan, who suffered mental health problems, was drafted in June of 2011, and later during his military service, criminal proceedings were initiated against him for committing self-injury to avoid performing his service duties for some time. 7 days after the announcement of the judgment on this case, H. Movisisyan was found dead in cell 8 of the isolation ward in Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. The NKR General Prosecutor’s Office High-Profile Cases Department initiated criminal proceedings on the death of H. Movsisyan under the clauses on causing someone to commit a suicide which was however discontinued based on the lack of any elements of crime in the actions of the penitentiary department staff and the isolation ward detainees, defendants and convicts. To make a legal assessment of the actions of the officials under H. Movsisyan’s criminal case, the case was further submitted to the RA Special Investigation Service with features of official negligence, and the Service initiated criminal case № 62202513 which was later discontinued as well. However, during the preliminary investigation, H. Movisisyan was not declared a victim and this became an obstacle to declaring his mother as victim’s successor.