The trial of Judge Arusyak Aleksanyan, her assistant Tamara Petrosyan, and lawyer Erik Aleksanyan continued on April 3 at the Anti-Corruption Criminal Court. The session is presided over by Judge Vahe Dolmazyan.
On October 17, 2022, the Supreme Judicial Council approved the motions of the General Prosecutor’s Office to initiate criminal prosecution against Judge Arusyak Aleksanyan and to consent to her deprivation of liberty. Within the same case, lawyer Erik Aleksanyan was also charged under Article 46-441 of the Criminal Code, that is, for assisting an official in abusing power or official authority or influence conditioned by them, or exceeding authority. Arusyak Aleksanyan’s assistant Tamara Petrosyan was also charged in this case.
According to the accusation, the judge made an obviously unfair judicial act and abused her official powers. She satisfied the motion of Erik Aleksanyan, the defender of Sergey Grigoryan, known by the nickname “Faz” and considered a criminal authority, changed the latter’s preventive measure, and released him from detention for a bail of 2.5 million drams. Sergey Grigoryan is a friend of Arusyak Aleksanyan’s brother, Rustam Aleksanyan.
According to Iravaban.net, at this session, Yerem Sargsyan, one of Arusyak Aleksanyan’s defenders, made his closing speech. In his speech, he addressed the legal grounds of the charges against Arusyak Aleksanyan and the lack of separation between them.
According to the accusation, Arusyak Aleksanyan’s assistant, Tamara Petrosyan, assisted the judge in making an unfair judicial act, but the defender emphasized that for all this, the latter should have had the appropriate authority, it should have been indicated what connection she had with releasing Sergey Grigoryan from detention and making an obviously unfair judicial act: “Is there anyone who at first glance can say that a judge’s assistant has any authority established by law to release someone from detention?”
According to the defender, for Tamara Petrosyan to be a co-perpetrator of the alleged crime as part of a group, she must be a special subject. He also spoke about the judge’s assistant and office employee performing the judge’s actions in a complementary manner: “How can you put the word complement for an assistant and say that she complemented the official authority of a judge as a subject with exclusive authority to administer justice, seriously?”
Yerem Sargsyan referenced the legislative norms that define the grounds for being a special subject, co-perpetrator, or assistant, and also mentioned the duties and powers attributed to the judge’s assistant, with which the latter carries out the judge’s instructions, and whatever is included in all that, their implementation is characterized by the features of assistance and not being a co-perpetrator.
Regarding the alleged excess of official powers attributed to Arusyak Aleksanyan, he noted the following: “They say that the fact that she made an obviously unfair judicial act, thereby, as well as by making indecent expressions toward the judge, discredited the judicial authority; now let’s forget the first part: is this part of the objective side of the crime, is making indecent expressions part of exceeding authority? How do you bring this, fit it into the excess of official authority, this should not be in the accusation at all, it was written to exaggerate, to create a background.”
The defender addressed the procedure of conducting operational-investigative measures and their legality: “If it was not a crime of medium gravity, was it permitted to conduct operational-investigative measures? It wasn’t permitted, that is, if they were conscientious and objective, it would become clear that they had no right to do that, but the law provides that you may have had one thing at first, then got something else, we should evaluate that something else. Now, if it doesn’t have and if these operational-investigative measures cannot be accepted as an extra-procedural document, how have they recognized it as an extra-procedural document? I petition that on this basis they be recognized as inadmissible evidence.”
According to the lawyer, criminal proceedings for making an obviously unfair judicial act were initiated in a situation when the judicial act had entered into legal force and had not been overturned. In this regard, he cited decisions of the Court of Appeal, noting that without examining the evidence, the criminal prosecution should have been terminated.
In his closing speech, the defender also spoke about the criminal prosecution carried out against Arusyak Aleksanyan before the Supreme Judicial Council gave its consent, raising the question of whether this right was guaranteed.
“Solely on the grounds that criminal prosecution was initiated against Arusyak Aleksanyan without the consent of the Supreme Judicial Council means that this entire proceeding is illegal. They examined 4 volumes of the case regarding Arusyak Aleksanyan, they examined everything except bribery, up to examining where family members have a plot of land, what car they sold, whether they wrote about it in the declaration, who left and returned to Armenia when. All this had to be examined, completed, and then come and say, ‘Supreme Judicial Council, give permission?’ That is, how can judges be independent, not bound by any state body?” said Sargsyan.
At the next session of the case, Arusyak Aleksanyan’s other defender, Hovsep Sargsyan, will make a closing speech.
The next session is on April 14.
Details are in the videos.
Mariam Shahnazaryan
