The examination of S. Simonyan’s appeal has ended; the decision is to be delivered on July 26
13:45, July 6, 2018 | News, Own news
On July 4, 2018, the RA Administrative Court of Appeal resumed and ended the examination of the appeal on the case of Susanna Simonyan, member of the Armenian Women’s Front.
G. Simonyan and her representative T. Siradeghyan, lawyer at HCA Vanadzor’s representative office in Yerevan, appealed the decision rendered by the RA Administrative Court on April 6, 2017. As demanded by the RA Police, the Court imposed a fine on S. Simonyan in the amount of 30,000 AMD and upheld in part the counter-claim on declaring the police actions unlawful.
The Court declared unlawful the RA Police actions of using physical force and rejected the demands to declare unlawful the actions of arresting S. Simonyan, failing to introduce themselves when arresting her, insulting her and filming her without her permission.
It should be recalled that Susanna Simonyan was a participant in the assembly that was held on June 22, 2018, during the discussion on choosing detention as a preventive measure against Zh. Sefilyan.
The police officers took her to the police station by force and then demanded to subject her to liability under Article 172.3 of the RA Code on Administrative Offenses for insulting a police officer (spitting on a police officer).
During the court session held on July 4, S. Simonyan’s representative T. Siradeghyan presented new evidence for the counter-claim with regard to arresting and filming her, as the Administrative Court stated in its decision that it was to be assessed under criminal law and only in the case of absence of a crime could it be reviewed under an administrative procedure.
T. Siradeghyan presented the relevant evidence for the crime report submitted after the judicial act being passed and the discussion of that crime report, following which it was not considered as an adequate report, and the courts rejected the submitted reports.
Despite the objection by R. Yepiskoposyan, the representative of the RA Police, the Court attached the evidence to the case file with the aim of assessing it in the final judicial act.
Afterwards, the Court presented the grounds and arguments of the appeal, through which the respondent had expressed the opinion that the Administrative Court had violated Articles 61 and 63 of the RA Constitution, Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights as well as the provisions of Articles 5, 27, 124 and 126 of the RA Administrative Procedure Code as spitting is not an insult; it is not a public expression; nor does it contain an offensive expression.
As regards the counter-claim, arguments were put forward, according to which the Court was obliged to consider the merits of the demands of the counterclaimant to declare unlawful the actions of arresting her and filming her without her consent and to give an adequate assessment to the evidence in the case.
It should be mentioned that the RA Police maintained in their response to the appeal that spitting is an insult and asked to reject the appeal.
After posing questions to the counterclaimant, the Court ended the examination of the appeal and scheduled the delivery of the decision for July 26, 2018. The decision is to be delivered at 4.06 pm.