On 4 April, 2024, the Criminal Court of Appeal partially satisfied the complaints of the prosecutor and the representative of the successor of the victim in the case of the murder of Haykaz Barseghyan, a cadet of the Vazgen Sargsyan Military Institute, and stiffened the punishment of the defendants in the case of the cadet’s murder, sentencing them to 18 years in prison each.

In particular, the Court of Appeal overturned the verdict of the First Instance Court of General Jurisdiction of the city of Yerevan and changed the legal assessment of the crime charged to the defendants Vache Sahakyan, Gnel Tevosyan, Movses Azaryan and Norik Sahakyan. They were found guilty for committing murder with particular cruelty, by a group of people or by an organized group, out of hooliganism, as provided for in Clauses 7 and 10 of Part 2 of Article 104 of the Criminal Code adopted on 18.04.2003.

Let’s remind that Gnel Tevosyan, Norik Sahakyan, Vache Sahakyan and Movses Azaryan were charged with Article 104, Part 2, Clauses 5, 7 and 10 of the Criminal Code adopted on 18.04.2003 for the act that they, being cadets of V. Sargsyan Military Institute, on 29 January, 2015, between 02:00 and 03:00, in the bedroom of the first battery of the first battalion of the military unit, a group of individuals with motivation of hooliganism brutally killed cadet Haykaz Barseghyan.

On October 23, 2015, the prosecutor confirmed the indictment of the criminal case against Haykaz Barseghyan and handed it over to the Court of General Jurisdiction of Avan and Nor Nork administrative districts of Yerevan.

By the verdict of 5 April, 2022, the First Instance Court of General Jurisdiction of the city of Yerevan reclassified the defendants’ accusations under Article 104, Part 2, Clause 7 of the Criminal Code and sentenced them to imprisonment for a period of 15 years each.

According to the decision of the Court of Appeals, the appeals of the defenders regarding the acquittal of were rejected.