The appeal of A. Sakunts, Chairman of HCA Vanadzor, to the Court of Criminal Appeals was also dismissed
16:40, May 20, 2016 | News, Own news | Right to Fair Trial | General Prosecutor's Office of Armenia
On May 16, 2016, the RA Court of Criminal Appeals examined the appeal filed against the ruling of the General Jurisdiction Court of First Instance of Kentron and Nork-Marash administrative districts of Yerevan city, RA dated March 31, 2016 on dismissing the complaint of Artur Sakunts, Chairman of HCA Vanadzor.
The court hearing was attended by appellant’s representative Arayik Zalyan, lawyer at HCA Vanadzor, and H. Yenokyan, prosecutor at the Department for High-Profile Cases at the RA Prosecutor General’s Office.
Appellant’s representative A. Zalyan presented the legal arguments and the requirement of the appeal stating that the ruling of the General Jurisdiction Court was based only on the fact that the applicant was not a party to the proceedings and had no right to judicial protection.
A. Zalyan also referred to the background of the case pointing out that the legal assessment of the actions of the persons who filed the crime report and the witnesses was obviously illegal and aimed to exert pressure on the latter.
The Court withdrew to the deliberation room to make a judgment. By its judgment published shortly after, the Court dismissed the appeal of Artur Sakunts, Chairman of HCA Vanadzor.
The RA Court of Appeals ruling above will be appealed before the Court of Cassation.
Note that on September 28, 2015, HCA Vanadzor filed a crime report with the RA Prosecutor General’s Office and the RA Special Investigation Service based on a hraparak.am news website publication of September 18, 2015 entitled ‘Out of here, or you’ll lose your uterus!” Another incident with Sashik Sargsyan’.
Criminal proceedings were initiated not based on the information in the crime report but rather under Article 333 (false crime reporting) of the RA Criminal Code.