The court hearing on the case of former Chairman of the Investigative Committee, former Supreme Council Deputy, and former Prosecutor General Aghvan Hovsepyan continued today, April 16, at the Anti-Corruption Criminal Court. The presiding judge is Tigran Davtyan.
According to Iravaban.net, prosecutor Koryun Serobyan asked one of the witnesses in Aghvan Hovsepyan’s case whether she had read her testimony and why she had no objections.
“They called me three times, and all three times I gave the same answer,” noted the witness, adding that due to tension, she might not understand some sentences well.
When the prosecutor asked if the woman was tense now, she answered yes. Koryun Simonyan said that in that case, they might call her for questioning later, and the woman might say that she was tense at the previous session and didn’t understand the question.
The witness insisted that she was not tense.
After witness Astghik Davtyan’s questioning, Aghvan Hovsepyan announced that he wanted to draw the court’s attention to “the investigator’s forgery, biased and one-sided investigation, which is revealed with each witness interrogation.”
Aghvan Hovsepyan read from a text on a paper in his hand, which stated: “Information has been received that the auction was of a formal nature.”
Hovsepyan emphasized that he had worked in the investigative apparatus for 45 years: “What do you say about this question from the investigator, that according to information, the auction was of a formal nature?”
The next witness, Ishkhan Ishkhanyan, was questioned at this session. He stated that he is not a relative of any of the participants in the court hearing, that he knows Aghvan Hovsepyan, and that they have a working relationship: “Around 2005, since the technical inspection carried out by the police was of a formal nature, we did not have any kind of equipment or building conditions, the police decided to appeal to the Government and the presidential office to discuss the saturation issues.
In 2005, a working group was established, we went to several countries and conducted studies.”
Witness Armen Sargsyan was also questioned. He stated that he knows Aghvan Hovsepyan as the Prosecutor General and that he worked at his villa: “I am an electrical engineer, I did electrical installation work at the Byurakan villa about 20 years ago.”
He also said that he was paid by Arshavir Sargsyan, who introduced him to the job: “Arshavir Sargsyan is my aunt’s daughter’s husband, so there is a kinship connection. I know that Arshavir Sargsyan and Aghvan Hovsepyan had a joint business, maybe there were other people too, I have no idea.”
Aghvan Hovsepyan’s advocate, Anna Mantashyan, asked witness Armen Sargsyan how he knew that Arshavir Sargsyan and Aghvan Hovsepyan had joint businesses or a business. The witness said that he heard it from Arshavir himself, but before that, he had said that “conversations on such topics with Arshavir are excluded.”
“I found out sitting around the table, I don’t know the name of the business, but when he returned from Russia and told me that I was going to work, I know that these people have joint businesses with Aghvan Hovsepyan,” said the witness.
He also stated that when Arshavir Sargsyan called him to the office and informed him about the job, he also said that they had a joint business. To the question from Aghvan Hovsepyan’s other advocate about whether the latter did not specify what kind of business he was talking about, the witness said, “I wouldn’t even allow myself to ask.”
In response to a question about the Byurakan villa, the witness said that he knew it belonged to Aghvan Hovsepyan; moreover, Arshavir Sargsyan sent him there to work and told him whose house he would be working in.
“He told me how I should behave and where I was going,” said witness Armen Sargsyan.
To the advocate’s question about whether the house could have belonged to another member of Aghvan Hovsepyan’s family, and he had no information about it, the latter said yes.
Aghvan Hovsepyan’s advocate, Anna Mantashyan, asked the witness how he had told the investigator during questioning that the villa cost 1 billion dollars, whereas now, during questioning, he did not mention any value.
“I just said that it could have cost several million dollars, how would I know what the value is,” the witness noted.
– In court, you answered all our questions by saying that Arshavir paid you in cash for the work you did; during the preliminary investigation, you said that Hamlet Makaryan paid you.
– Payments were made in both cases.
– No, during the preliminary investigation, you only said that Arshavir gave you money once, 350,000 drams, I announced your testimony.
– I understand, but there is some misunderstanding.
– But you answered my question that Hamlet Makaryan did not give you any money at all.
– Regarding Byurakan, Hamlet Makaryan did not pay because he came and went in a consultative capacity.
At the next session, the questioning of other witnesses in the case will continue.
Details in the videos.
