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“We would like to resolve systemic issues. We, as Human Right Defenders, have witnessed a crime and have reported it”, states advocate Edmon Marukyan”. “I saw the new decree issued by the Minister ofJustice atone of the detention facilities in January, pursuant to which, detention facilities permit people to enter based on the RA Court resolution. This happened after we had submitted the claim and had initiated court proceedings”.

“Armenian Helsinki Committee” NGO, “Civil Society Institute” NGO and Helsinki Citizens Assembly-Vanadzor filed an appeal to the RA Criminal Court of Appeal against the 18.01.2011 Resolution made by the RA Court of General Jurisdiction of Kentron and Nork-Marash Administrative Districts. They claim to abrogate the resolution taken by the Court of First Instance and adopt a new judicial act in order to oblige the RA General Prosecutor’s Office to bring up a case against the Deputy of RA Prosecutor General’s office and head of “Nubarashen” Detention Facility regarding the illegality of keeping a person in custody.

On May 17, 2011 the RA Criminal Court of Appeal heard the appeal and the response to the claim. The court session was canceled because the Prosecutor’s Office had not sent a written response to the plaintiff’s party.  Edmon Marukyan, the representative of three plaintiff organizations at court, noted that Sargis Poghosyan, citizen of the Republic of Armenia, was illegally kept in custody at “Nubarashen” Penitentiary from August 5th til September 1, 2010 without grounds as prescribed by law. This fact was identified by the heads of the “Civil Society Institute”, the “Armenian Helsinki Committee” and the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly- Vanadzor, who had visited “Nubarashen” Penitentiary as representatives of the Public Monitoring Group for penitentiaries of the RA Ministry of Justice.

S. Poghosyan was arrested at “Zvartnots” airport by police officials. He was detained by a US Law Enforcement Agency for his part in a banking fraud scheme. Seventy-two hours after his arrest, Poghosyan was released. “But based on the 28.07.2011 diffusion card filed by the NCB of the US Interpol and the RA General Prosecutor gave an order to put him under arrest until law enforcement agencies of the USA sent documents”,  as stated in the appeal. With no appropriate resolution, Poghosyan was moved to “Nubarashen” Penitentiary and accepted by penitentiary head T. Navasardyan. On September 1, 2010, Poghosyan was released by the deputy by RA General Prosecutor A. Danielyan’s order. Marukyan noted in the court order that Part 1 of Article 5 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and Article 16 of the RA Constitutionhad been violated, which states that “no one shall be deprived of his liberty except in accordance with procedure as prescribed by law.” Whereas, according to the advocate, the local courts had not reached a resolution regarding Poghosyan’s arrest and the arrest sanction given by the Eastern Richmond Court of Virginia was taken as basis.

“In this regard, the convention refers to the domestic legislation and defines the obligation to carry out domestic legislative norms”, notes Marukyan. According to Part 2 of Article 3 of the RA Law on “keeping arrested and detained persons”, the application of detention as a preventive measure for holding persons at detention facilities should be taken by the court,pursuant to the Criminal Code. (RA Criminal Code, article 280)Artur Sakunts, head of Helsinki Citizens Assembly-Vanadzor, drew the attention of the Court to the fact that G. Avetisyan, judge of the RA Court of General Jurisdiction of Kentron and Nork-Marash Administrative Districts, read the non-procedural side of S. Poghosyan claim in the court room. “The judge read the citizens claim at the court session and included part of it in the verdict without legal grounds”, added Sakunts.A representative of the Prosecutor’s office asserted that the claim was groundless and was subject to rejection because Poghosyan was detained on an arrest sanction given by the Eastern Richmond Court of Virginia which was based on a two-sided document signed by the two countries that are equally lawful, hence, the domestic laws have not been violated. “I think that criminal legislation is imperfect and contradicts the international commitments and that is why we are guided by international rights as stipulated by Article 6 of the Constitution.  “The International documents are equally lawful”, added Nelly Harutyunyan, representative of the Prosecutor’s office.

Advocate Edmon Marukyan stated in his claim that no two-sided international contract was signed between the Republic of Armenia and USA regarding the legal assistance of criminal cases and that the USA has not signed the European Convention on Extradition to which the responding party was making a reference. As Marukyan states, pursuant to the RA Legislation, the resolution of the RA Court is a mandatory condition for the detention of a person. The arrest of S. Poghosyan was neither “prescribed by law” nor “solely taken by the Court” as the RA Constitution and the European Convention of Human Rights states. The Court of First Instance rejected the claim submitted by the three NGOs by taking into account citizen S. Poghosyan’s claim, by which he appealed that his rights had not been violated and he had not authorized any party to protect his rights.

Marukyan considers the court’s statement groundless. After the court trial, he explained that they had applied to the Court not to protect Poghosyan’s rights by the latter’s authorization but by their own initiative to prevent cases of illegal arrests in the future.  The expectations of the plaintiff party from the local courts are not great. In case of rejection, they intend to apply to the European Court of Human Rights.

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