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On May 6, 2016, the RA Administrative Court, presided by judge H. Ayvazyan, resumed the trial examination of the administrative case under a claim by the RA Police against Gayane Arustamyan to bring her to administrative liability and the counter-claim by Gayane Arustamyan against the RA Police to declare the RA Police actions unlawful.

Note that the previous court hearing was adjourned for the Court to consider the motion of G. Arustamyan’s representative on suspending the proceedings and applying to the RA Constitutional Court.

The court hearing was attended by Sona Melikyan, representative of plaintiff and counter-defendant RA Police, and Tatevik Siradeghyan, lawyer at Yerevan Office of HCA Vanadzor and representative of defendant and counter-plaintiff G. Arustamyan.

Having considered the motion of G. Arustamyan’s representative, the Court found it groundless and subject to dismissal.

In response to the question of presiding judge H. Ayvazyan, T. Siradeghyan, representative of defendant G. Artustamyan, said that she had another motion. She stated that she submitted to the Court a motion with 2 requirements but since their reasoning was similar to some extent, she submitted them both in a single document.

T. Siradeghyan first motioned to suspend the proceedings of the case and apply to the RA Constitutional Court finding that though Article 3(2)(1) and Article 214(1) of the RA Administrative Procedure Code and Article 223(2) of the RA Code of Administrative Offenses provided for an administrative agency or an official to apply to the RA Administrative Court to bring a person to administrative liability, however as far as Article 172.3 of the RA Code of Administrative Offenses is concerned, the right to apply to court exclusively for officials suffering insults should be defined clearly. T. Siradeghyan substantiated the above requirement by the fact that the Article in question stipulated administrative responsibility specifically for insulting a police officer or a military serviceman; an insult was an act aimed against the honor and dignity of a person, and therefore, he/she should be able to protect his/her rights and legal interests personally since the RA Constitution reserves the rights to judicial protection and a fair trial specifically to a particular person.

Hence, T. Siradeghyan motioned to suspend the administrative proceedings and appeal to the RA Constitutional Court under Article 71 of the RA Law on Constitutional Court so that it decided on the compliance of Article 214(1) of the RA Administrative Procedure Code and Article 223(1) of the RA Code of Administrative Offenses to Articles 61 and 63 of the RA Constitution.   

By her second motion, T. Siradeghyan requested the Court to consider it in case of dismissing the previous one. Along with the arguments provided in the previous motion, she stated that if the claim was not submitted to the court by the particular person affected by an insult, he/she was deprived of the remedies to protect his/her rights and legal interests since he/she might neither be involved in the proceedings as an aggrieved party, nor lodge to the court a civil claim to the account that the insult had been uttered in terms of performance of his/her official duties. Also, T. Siradeghyan mentioned that the RA Administrative Procedure Code did not provide for an administrative agency to lodge to the court a claim on protection of the rights of an official and the insult uttered to an official might not be viewed as an insult uttered to an administrative agency.

Hence, T. Siradeghyan found that in this case the claim should have been lodged to the court by Davit Piliposyan, Police Sergeant at 2nd company of the 1st battalion of the RA Police Patrol Guard Service Regiment. Taking this into account, G. Arustamyan’s representative motioned that the Court suspended the administrative proceedings on the part of the claim lodged by the RA Police on the grounds that it had been lodged by a person obviously not entitled to lodge it.

S. Melikyan, representative of the RA Police, objected to the motions above considering them both to lack merits.

The Court asked the representative of defendant and counter-plaintiff G. Arustamyan a question to find out the reasoning behind the argument that the claim had been lodged by a person obviously not entitled to lodge it. T. Siradeghyan mentioned that perhaps that circumstance was not obvious to the Court at the moment of admitting the claim, and it was clarified during the trial proceedings since the examination of the case made it clear that the alleged insulting remark had been uttered to a particular police officer and therefore it was him who should have lodged the claim to the court.

The Court adjourned the hearing to consider the motion above and scheduled the next hearing on a different turn.

The parties to the trial will be further notified of the date and time of the next court hearing.