Court of Appeals found that the actions of the police officers against Gayane Arustamyan were lawful
19:02, May 16, 2016 | News, Own news | Freedom of Movement, Right to be free from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment, Right to liberty and security | Gayane Arustamyan
By its ruling of May 2, 2016, the RA Court of Criminal Appeals dismissed the appeal of Gayane Arustamyan’s representative Tatevik Siradeghyan, lawyer at Yerevan Office of HCA Vanadzor, against the ruling dated March 17, 2016 of the General Jurisdiction Court of Arabkir and Kanaker-Zeytun administrative districts of Yerevan city, RA, on dismissing the complaint of G. Arustamyan’s representative A. Sakunts, Chairman of HCA Vanadzor, against the decree of Investigator for High-Profile Cases at RA SIS A. Tadevosyan dated August 8, 2015 on not initiating criminal prosecution and discontinuing the criminal proceedings.
By its ruling, the RA Court of Criminal Appeals finds that the court of first instance made a legal, well-grounded and well-reasoned judicial act, considering that according to the observations of the Court of Appeals as well, the police officers did not abuse their official powers and their actions were lawful.
As for the observation of the victim’s representative that the agency responsible for the investigation took no measures to reveal the link between Gayane Arustamyan’s current health problems and the actions of the police officers, the Court states that the above is not sufficiently substantiated by invoking the expert’s testimony on this issue.
Hence, the Court found that the conclusions in the appeal of Gayane Arustamyan’s representative were groundless and the appeal was subject to dismissal.
The above ruling of the RA Court of Criminal Appeals will be appealed before the Court of Cassation.
Note that on May 7, 2015, G. Arustamyan was arrested for insulting a RA Police officer and apprehended to the RA Police Yerevan city Kentron Division where police officers showed inhuman and degrading treatment and used physical force towards her due to which she sustained bodily injuries.
A crime report on the incident was submitted; based on the crime report, the RA SIS initiated criminal proceedings under Article 309(2) of the RA Criminal Code. However, following the preliminary investigation, A. Tadevosyan, responsible for the investigation, made a decree on not initiating criminal prosecution and discontinuing criminal proceedings on the pretext of the lack of corpus delicti.
The investigator’s decree above was appealed first to higher authorities and than to a court of law.