On 17 January, the Anti-Corruption Court started the judicial investigation into the confiscation of property of alleged illicit origin that belongs to the leader of the “Prosperous Armenia” Party, former Deputy of the National Assembly, businessman Gagik Tsarukyan and his related persons. Judge Lili Drmeyan presided over the session.

According to the lawsuit, the Department for Confiscation of Property of Illicit Origin of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Republic of Armenia submitted a request to the court to confiscate in favor of the Republic of Armenia from the defendants the property of illicit origin, in particular:

• 79 real estates. 
• 42 vehicles.
• Acquisition cost of 8 unidentified vehicles worth 348 million 194 thousand drams.
• The amount of the ceded claim right: about 33 million drams.
• Market value of 10 real estates, which legally belong to Gagik Tsarukyan. 
• 39 shares and bonds in legal entities.
• Right to demand loans of 63 billion drams.
• The amount of loans provided to 12 individuals and legal entities (who could not be identified) is about 16.8 billion drams.
• Demand for confiscation of 86 billion 400 million drams, which is the sum of income from the use of property of illicit origin and payments, transfers and other outcomes not justified by legal income.

According to Iravaban.net, at today’s court session, the secretary of sessions informed the court that the Tsarukyan family, except for Gagik Tsarukyan, suspended the powers of their representatives before the session, on 17 January. Now Gagik Tsarukyan’s wife Javahir Tsarukyan, Kolik Tsarukyan, Nver Tsarukyan, Roza Tsarukyan, Hovhannes Tsarukyan and Arpi Avetisyan have no representatives.

Further Iravaban.net  learnt that before the session Gagik Tsarukyan suspended the powers of several lawyers, except Harutyun Harutyunyan. Lawyer Varazdat Asatryan was involved in the case on 16 January and Smbat Minasyan a few days ago. On that basis, the latter petitioned to postpone the session and give them, the newly involved lawyers, opportunity to familiarize themselves with the materials.

“Each of the lawyers has a certain agreement and scope of obligations with the client. If we reject Mr. Asatryan’s petition, the extent of the duties that he must fulfill will remain incomplete. In addition, I think Mr. Minasyan’s power of attorney was signed on 16 or 15 January. Therefore, we currently have 2 new representatives involved. Under these conditions, rejecting the petition for a short postponement, considering that it is the first court session, I think will violate the equality of the parties,” Harutyun Harutyunyan said.

Hamlet Harutyunyan, Prosecutor of the Department for Confiscation of Property of Illicit Origin of Prosecutor General’s Office objected to the petition.

“The court has just checked and considered the powers of 3 representatives to be proper. According to which, Mr. Harutyunyan and Minasyan got acquainted with the case materials much earlier. Mr. Harutyunyan submitted a response to the lawsuit, which proves that they apparently got acquainted with the materials. An impression may be created that if the representative has just been involved and is not familiar with the materials, he will not have the opportunity to effectively implement the protection of the right, but this is not the case,” the prosecutor said.

In addition, the plaintiff’s representative noted that the presentation of the basis and subject of the claim is a procedural action against which the defendant will have the opportunity to object and ask questions in the future.

Judge Lili Drmeyan announced a 2-minute break, then returned to the session hall and granted the petition. The session was adjourned.

It is noteworthy that other judges of the Anti-Corruption Court, under the same conditions, did not satisfy similar petitions regarding postponing the session. For example, Smbat Minasyan, the representative of the defendants in the case regarding the former Prime Minister of the RA Hovik Abrahamyan and 15 persons related to him, requested to postpone the hearing, as he was not familiar with the case materials. In the same case, Lusntag Bezhanyan also submitted a motion to postpone the session. Judge Karapet Badalyan, presiding over that session, recorded that there were procedural actions that could be carried out during the current session, and the lawyers could present their position after getting acquainted with the case materials. The court considered and rejected the submitted petition regarding the postponement of the session in the mentioned case.

In some cases, the judges considered such petitions in the context of dishonest use of his rights by the lawyer.

Yevgenya Hambardzumyan