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Suspect in bandit assaults, Arman Yengibaryan, who was murdered near Yerevan “Garegin Nzhdeh” square on June 14 as a result of 2 gunshot wounds fired by a police official, is not recognized a victim by SIS.

Edmon Marukyan, advocate of Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly-Vanadzor had applied to SIS to recognize Arman Yengibaryan as a victim; the latter’s father as a successor of the victim and to have their approval to enroll him as a representative of the victim’s successor.

Yesterday we were notified why SIS declined the claim to grant Arman Yengibaryan a victim status. “With regard to the claim addressed to the head of RA Special Investigation Service, I declare that pursuant to Article 58 of RA Criminal Procedure Code, “The person is recognized as an aggrieved party, in respect to whom a moral, physical or proprietary damage has been caused by a deed forbidden by the Criminal Code”. Therefore, the issue of recognizing Arman Yengibaryan’s father, Sergey Yengibaryan, as a successor of the victim and you, as a representative of the victim’s successor will be discussed after the RA Police officials’ act has yielded a final legal evaluation”.

It is worth noting that the Police had considered the aforementioned action taken by the police official as neutralization of a suspect in bandit assaults, by justifying that Arman Yengibaryan had used a firearm against the pursuing police officials. After the incident, the case of bandit assaults under the name of alleged “Jrmugh” Company agent, was moved from the Police to SIS and was added to the criminal case with the episode of Arman Yengibaryan’s death (filed with the features of Article 107 of RA Criminal Code on “Murder of a criminal through the use of excessive measures when capturing the latter”).

In an interview with 1in.am, Edmon Marukyan commented to the response received from SIS as follows, “I had applied to SIS to recognize Arman Yengibaryan a victim based on the fact that they had already filed a criminal case pursuant to “Murder of a criminal through the use of excessive measures when capturing the latter”. It means the preliminary investigation body accepts that an unlawful action has occurred in this case. Consequently, if a moral, physical or proprietary damage has been caused by a deed forbidden by the Criminal Code, he must be recognized a victim. Based on this logic, I have applied to the investigator of SIS and received a response, according to which, they will address the issue of recognizing Arman Yengibaryan as a victim after they reveal the lawfulness of the police officials’ actions.

What does it mean? If they find out that the perpetrator was indeed Arman Yengibaryan, who attempted to escape, and they undertook special measures to prevent it causing his death, it will mean that a use of excessive measures has occurred.

Won’t they recognize him a victim in this case? They should have recognized him a victim by now, that is, from the moment of filing a criminal case, but they failed to do so, which according to us, is a violation. I must say this case is proceeding as planned by the Police, according to them, “they have killed the right person”, as he was a criminal and had committed the crime… It means that the criminal case is proceeding in their targeted direction, they have been collecting proofs to justify that Arman was the wanted person.”

By the advocate’s words, the actions of the police officials were initially wrongly termed and there is a great scope of activities due for the representative of the victim’s successor.

E. Marukyan drew our attention to the following circumstance: if the preliminary investigation body states that the Police officers used a firearm after the gunshots fired by Arman Yengibaryan which leaded to the latter’s death, it means a murder with necessary protection through excessive measures had occurred. It means the criminal case should have been filed pursuant to Article 108 instead of Article 107 of RA Criminal Code: capturing the criminal… “How can you know if the person has committed a crime?” “If he has ringed the doorbell of one’s house, does it mean he has already committed a crime?” notes the advocate.

By the way, the punishment for the deeds, prescribed by both of the articles, is maximum three years of imprisonment, but Edmon Marukyan is more interested in the logic of terming the action in line with several important circumstances revealed over the case.

“If the case is viewed within the frames of Article 107, they simply want to single out the fact of the criminal to use that circumstance, but on the other hand, it is stated in the case that the police officials were dressed in civil uniforms. But if the police officials were dressed in civil uniforms, how would the person know he was being perused by armed police officials. Maybe the man was trying to protect himself, while the police killed the latter. In short, there are numerous factors yet to be revealed during the preliminary investigation, because the police claim he was the criminal. The criminal cases over bandit assaults will be closed, because the perpetrator is dead and the court proceedings will continue under Article 104.”

However, according to the advocate’s viewpoint, the criminal case should have been initially filed pursuant to Point 6, Part 2, of Article 104 of RA Criminal Code(murder committed in a way dangerous for the life of many people), which is punished with 8-15 years of imprisonment or life incarceration. He explains that the murder was committed in an overcrowded place near the metro station, in a way dangerous for the life of many people. He thinks that the case should have initiated under Article 104, they should have recognized the murdered person a victim. And if the investigation later revealed that the murdered person was the criminal, and the Police officials would pursue the criminal based on certain proofs, in that case the criminal case could have been launched under Article 107. But is it possible that two police officials shot at the same time? If only one of them fired the gunshot, he would not fire the second one after the target criminal fell down. (It is illogical that the police official used a burst of machine-gun fire with “Makarov” firearm in a public place).

“It is possible. We know there were two police officials dressed in civil uniform. As far as I know they were operative officials”, responded the interlocutor.

We also studied the RA law on “Police”, article 32 of which foresees the grounds, conditions and limits for the application of a firearm. Pursuant to it, The Police employees should be entitled to use firearms in the following cases:

1. while defending citizens from attacks dangerous for the life and health of citizens;
2. while repulsing an attack made upon a police officer when his/her life or health are endangered.
Article 33 of RA Law on Police foresees guarantees for the personal safety of an armed Police officer. According to it, The armed police officer shall have the right to bare his/her arm and prepare it for an action if he/she finds that there may occur in the created situation a necessity to exercise a firearm pursuant to article 32 of this law. The Police officer shall have the right to exercise a firearm without prior notification and at any attempt by the person to be arrested to approach the police officer executing arrest with a bared firearm (by violating the distance required by him), to make an unexpected abrupt movement without permission, to take his/her hands to his/her pockets or exercise a firearm.

P.S.
Currently, the preliminary investigation body must prove that at least one of the aforementioned grounds was present. Nonetheless, not recognizing the murdered person a victim initially, casts doubt over objectivity of the investigation.

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