"For two years now our family has been under siege. People we were friends with for forty disappeared over night; our telephone doesn't ring, no one cares about us," says Ludmila Bojolyan, the wife of Murad Bojolyan, an orientalist who was convicted of high treason and given a ten-year sentence. Pivotal changes have occurred in their children's lives as well. "I lost my job and my friends. What happened to my father affected my personal life. Today, my last name prevents me from finding a job and from living in this country," says the Bojolyans' daughter, Alina.

Murad Bojolyan was arrested on January 26, 2002 and sentenced to ten years in prison by Armenian courts of three instances. Without going into the details of the case, we would note that the presumption of innocence was violated in relation to Bojolyan and his family from the moment of his arrest. As soon as he was arrested, before the court reached a verdict, investigators used the media to spread the word that Bojolyan was a Turkish spy.

"At the start of the investigation, some newspapers called him a spy and a Turk. How did they get that information, or how did they discover all this when the preliminary investigation wasn't even complete? Who gives the media the right to insult and discredit people without any proof," Ludmila Bojolyan asks. She says her husband's presumption of innocence was violated not only by the press, but by investigators as well.

"Ten days after my husband's arrest, Grigor Grigoryan, deputy minister of national security, told the press that they had sufficient evidence that Bojolyan was a Turkish spy," she says. The Bojolyan family has come to the conclusion that there is no future for them in this country, and they see no difference between now and 1937, when Stalin's great purges began.

The notion of the presumption of innocence is not understood by many people in today's Armenia . Some lawyers say that even their colleagues don't perceive it correctly. But lawyer Ruben Sahakyan believes that it couldn't be simpler: "We just should be good enough not to call a person a criminal unless his guilt is proven." Sahakyan is guided by Article 41 of the Armenian Constitution, which clearly states, "A person accused of a crime shall be considered innocent until his or her guilt is proven in accordance with the law, by a court verdict which has legally entered into force."

"There was no connection between reality and the constitution of the Soviet Union ," lawyer Hrair Tovmasyan remembers. "Many of us witnessed how the presumption of innocence was distorted, and how cases were reexamined for years and verdicts of 'not guilty' were passed in relation to people who had already served their sentences, beginning with 1937."

The principle of the presumption of innocence was included in the constitution in 1995. According to Tovmasyan, from the point of view of legislative technique, clarity, and content, the definition may be considered perfect, but in reality, it's a very different picture. "Even if a person confesses to a crime, it's not a sufficient condition for accusing him or her of the crime. Only a judge, during a court proceeding, can, after considering all the evidence, come to such a conclusion and consider it proven that a person is guilty or not guilty," he explains.

Studies have shown that in our country, the principle that a person is innocent until proven guilty is violated at every stage - from the moment of the arrest to the moment the sentence enters into force. Often, the preliminary investigators get so excited by a case that they forget about the principle of keeping information connected with preliminary investigations secret, and provide the media with very important facts, or even with the entire indictment. Sometimes they publicly label the person a criminal.

Mikael Danielyan, a human rights activist, says that preliminary investigators frequently cross the line: "The case is under investigation, but the indictment is published in the press. When you ask journalists, they say that the investigator provided them with it. But the investigator has no right to give the entire indictment for publication-he may only provide certain information."

The head of the supervision department of the Office of the Prosecutor General, Gagik Avetisyan, agrees in part: "I too find that the provision of information about a certain person is first a matter of human dignity, and then of the investigative body. We should consider whether publicizing it violates the principle of the confidentiality of the preliminary investigation. Of course, there is a collision between the law, the constitution, human rights, the presumption of innocence, and public awareness, and there is also public demand. The publication of reliable information in the media is not a violation of the principle of the presumption of innocence." Avetisyan could not remember any instance in his long career when he violated the principle, though he didn't rule out the possibility. "I probably did, but didn't sense it. I don't remember".

The principle of the presumption of innocence is also violated in court - by judges, prosecutors, and victims. "In court, it becomes clear that the judge and the prosecutor are on one side, and the defendant and his lawyer are on the other side. The judge is the defender of the interests of the law-he should not side with the prosecutor," Ruben Sahakyan points out. "Sometimes the victim hurls abuse at the defendant and from the human point of view, it's understandable. But when the prosecutor hurls abuse at the defendant and the judge listens to it, this is a gross violation of the presumption of innocence."

Prosecutor Gagik Avetisyan doesn't deny that this happens. "Sometimes we get carried away by our emotions, and call a person a murderer, a criminal. I, too, consider that to be a violation of the presumption of innocence."

Judge Arayik Kubanyan, of the court of first instance of the Erebuni district of Yerevan, says that any position or opinion pronounced in the courtroom influences the trial. According to Kubanyan, a judge personally violates the presumption of innocence if he or she "expresses an opinion before the court proceedings are over."

According to Vardan Harutiunyan, a human rights activist, the principle the presumption of innocence is completely absent in the courtroom. "Our courts haven't taken shape yet; our judges are so dependent on the government that it is clear from the beginning of a trial what the outcome will be. In this sense, the presumption of innocence does not exist as such," he maintains.

The presumption of innocence is often violated by the media as well. The law allows journalists to publish information about someone who has been arrested, but this contradicts Article 41 of the Constitution on the presumption of innocence.

"Every time I watch the TV program "02", which is run by the police, I think that the journalists who prepare the series have no idea that there is a constitution in Armenia , which stipulates the principle that you are innocent until proven guilty," says Hrair Tovmasyan. "They present a suspect as the person who committed the crime."

Vardan Harutiunyan also points to the popular "02" as a vivid example of violation of the presumption of innocence: "They announce all over the country that a certain person is a criminal. Later, that person is acquitted of the crime, but he or she has already been labeled. This is especially outrageous when it concerns minors. They have their entire live ahead of them, and to accuse them of committing any crime is to put a label on them."

Mikael Danielyan explains that "02" violates the presumption of innocence in all cases, even when arrested person in custody confesses to the crime. "We know very well how these confessions are extorted," he says.

The lawyers and rights activists I spoke to add that photographing or videotaping a suspect without his consent violates the presumption of innocence as well.

"I don't think that most people accused of committing a crime want to be videotaped. I visit jails often, and 90% of the prisoners don't want to have their pictures taken or to be filmed. Those who are under preliminary investigation don't like it at all, since they still have a chance of being acquitted," Vardan Harutiunyan says.

One of the main prerequisites for guaranteeing the presumption of a defendant's innocence is his or her own familiarity with the principle, but the judges, prosecutors, lawyers, and human rights activists I spoke to were unable to cite one instance in their years of experience when a defendant knew enough to complain that this right had been violated.