In the Anti-Corruption Criminal Court, under the presidency of Judge Meri Mosinyan, the trial continues in the case of former Gyumri Mayor Vardan Ghukasyan and 4 other defendants, one of whom is his brother, and the other is his son.
According to Iravaban.net, at the beginning of the court session, Public Prosecutor Anna Mkrtchyan read the charges brought against Vardan Ghukasyan, according to which Vardan Ghukasyan, coming to criminal agreement with the other 4 defendants in this case, criminally acquired illegally originated real estate from the Gyumri community. On August 12, 2009, a contract was signed between defendants Armen Matevosyan and H. Grigoryan regarding the alienation of real estate valued at 8 million 357 thousand 427 AMD, which is considered a historical and cultural immovable monument of the Republic of Armenia. Subsequently, the property was given as a gift to Vardan Ghukasyan’s son, Spartak Ghukasyan, who created the illusion that the property was acquired legally.
Vardan Ghukasyan’s brother Gevorg Ghukasyan is accused of coming to preliminary agreement with his brother, that is, realizing and foreseeing that the 2335.15 square meter land plot located in the “Central Park” area of Gyumri city is being acquired from the community through criminal means – as a result of abuse of official position and official forgery, as well as realizing and foreseeing that this property would actually be transferred to Vardan Ghukasyan’s disposal, helped the latter to avoid responsibility for the crime committed.
Gevorg Ghukasyan’s defender noted several circumstances. According to him, objectively, such actions could not have taken place for several reasons. These properties were registered in 2002, while Gyumri’s master plan was drawn in 2005. This means that the owner of property registered in 2002 has all rights to their property. Gevorg Ghukasyan’s company applied to the municipality, participated in legal actions, and acquired ownership.
“Gevorg Ghukasyan had no obligation to possess Gyumri’s master plan. The factual circumstance of the case is directly incorrectly formulated in the accusation. The accusation states that Vardan Ghukasyan was the chairman of the auction committee and signed some documents. If we examine the documents of the relevant properties, we will see that Vardan Ghukasyan did not sign any document. No property concealed its ownership.
Now in all of this, what constituted money laundering? In this case, considering Gevorg Ghukasyan being Vardan Ghukasyan’s brother as a crime is illegal. All persons who could have provided false certificates during this criminal case have been interrogated and none of them indicated that they received a proposal from Gevorg Ghukasyan to falsify certificates. 50 percent of the property belongs to Gevorg Ghukasyan. Now how did it happen that Gevorg Ghukasyan assisted? As a lawyer, it is not clear to me what exactly Gevorg Ghukasyan is being accused of? Under such conditions, I believe that the accusation is illegal,” noted the lawyer.
In turn, Gevorg Ghukasyan noted that 25 years have passed, “thoughts don’t come” to remember, tell:
“I did well, building it.”
The lawyer of defendant Sasha Zakaryan (former employee of Gyumri municipality who was involved in the transaction) noted that his client does not accept the charges brought against him and since they haven’t yet examined the evidence, it becomes clearly apparent that the act attributed to his client does not correspond to reality. According to the lawyer, studying the concluded transactions makes it obvious that there was no intention to conceal the ownership of the mentioned property, therefore they do not accept the attributed charges and believe that in subsequent phases it will become clear that the mentioned transaction was purely a result of civil-legal relations.
Defendant Sasha Zakaryan noted that the purchased property was not used, that’s why it was sold:
“This means no one has the right to buy a house, sell a house, or no one has the right to be friends with this or that person.”
Another defendant in the case, Armen Matevosyan, has been charged with, being the chairman of Gyumri municipality’s auction committee, realizing the consequences of his actions, assisting in the legalization of property criminally obtained through abuse of official position by Vardan Ghukasyan – legitimizing the acquisition of obviously criminally obtained property under the veil of legal activity, concealing the real ownership and method of disposal of the property, distorting the source of criminal origin and eliminating criminal traces. The defendant, expressing his position regarding his committed crime, noted that he does not plead guilty.
The court also discussed the motion submitted by Hovhannes Harutyunyan on March 6 regarding lifting the arrest on the property, which the court rejected.
The court session ended, the next court session in this case will take place on January 9, 2025, at 12:00.
Lilit Khachatryan
