HY RU EN
Asset 3

Loading

End of content No more pages to load

Your search did not match any articles

Sara Petrosyan

The judge received an order

We suggest that anyone who sees no corruption within the court system, and always decides, after due consideration, that if illegal things occur, they are due to a lack of knowledge on the part of the judge, take a look at one simple case that was examined again on March 3, 2004 by the Court of Appeal. On March 25, 2000, Yerevan resident Artavazd Sahakyan was driving his friend's car along the highway between Dzaghidzor and Marts in the Lori Marz when a piece of a tree fell and crushed the car. Sahakyan's young daughter suffered a fractured cranium. She was unconscious for five days, and her life was saved thanks to a successful surgery. The girl lost her memory and was unable to continue her studies at a school of general education.

Artavazd Sahakyan went to the Court of First Instance of the Kanaker-Zeytun district of Yerevan, suing the governor's office of Lori for negligence and demanding compensation for the damage caused. At first, the court was disinclined to consider the case, believing it impossible to seek compensation from the authorities. Only after the intervention of the Association of Investigative Journalists was Sahakyan's suit accepted for examination. He won the case, and the governor's office was obliged to pay 825,000 drams (about $1,500) for the repair of the car and the medical treatment. However, Governor Henrik Kochinyan could not reconcile himself to the idea of paying the damages, and he appealed the ruling.

The representatives of the governor's office have consistently repeated that they are responsible for the safety of the highway and that they have even presented the government with a project for constructing a protective wall, clearing away rocks, and other works, but because no money was allocated from the state budget, they have been unable to perform the work. This was not the only such accident on this stretch of highway; others have been fatal.

The Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal both found for Sahakyan. But the Court of Appeal found that it was too much to demand compensation for both the car repair and the girl's medical treatment and, without any explanation, decided to oblige the governor's office to pay for the medical treatment alone, and then only 405,000 drams (about $750).

The Chamber for Civil and Economic Cases of the Court of Cassation reviewed the verdicts of the Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal, based on the governor's office's appeal against these rulings. And the Court of Cassation reversed the verdict of the Court of Appeal on the ingenious grounds that since the accident had occurred "as a result of a force majeur" the plaintiff has no right to demand compensation, and sent the case for a new hearing to the Court of Appeal. In this case, force majeur must have been a natural disaster, and it would have been more appropriate if the court had mentioned what kind of natural disaster (known only to the Chamber for Civil and Economic Cases) the accident occurred during- an earthquake, a flood?

Once again, Judge Tigran Sahakyan (assisted by judges V. Avanesyan and G. Matinyan) didn't disappoint his bosses, and spared no efforts to execute the higher court's order and to ward off through a new trial the consequences of the "force majeur" coming from the governor's office. It is well known within legal circles that a formulation like this by the Chamber for Civil and Economic Cases represents an order, and if after a verdict is reversed the case is referred to Tigran Sahakyan, then this formulation will be the basis for his ruling. We suggest that the Minister of Justice and the Chairman of the Court of Cassation study some of the cases examined by Tigran Sahakyan, and determine if we are correct. We are prepared to present them with a number of examples of such cooperation between the two instances. If this is a question of corruption, the judge should be punished, but if it is determined once again that this was a result of "negligence", then at least the question of his certification should be addressed.

From the very beginning, the judge attempted to defeat the plaintiff in the legal field and to ignore all his arguments. He was unsuccessful in the former, but he didn't accept the arguments, even when the governor's representative stated again that the governor's office had not received the money from the 2000 state budget to perform the projected works to insure the safety of the highway, including the construction of a protective wall. In fact, the respondent acknowledged that highway services, including the construction of protective walls, were the responsibility of the Lori governor's office.

But even if the governor's office was unable to build protective walls, it should have performed preventive maintenance, and as they said in the courtroom, they should have removed loose rocks. According to Article 1063 of the Civil Code of Armenia, "The damage caused to citizens or legal entities is subject to compensation by the state or local government agencies, not only if they occurred as a result of unlawful actions but as a result of negligence as well."

This case shows that the court system is not only not separate from, but is accreted with, other branches of government, in this case with the executive power. An appeal signed by the governor of Lori, Henrik Kochinyan, is so impressive in and of itself that the court is unable to turn it down. Imagine, for instance, a case in which the governor's office demands compensation from a citizen. Would the court take his or her poverty into consideration to dismiss the case?

Write a comment

If you found a typo you can notify us by selecting the text area and pressing CTRL+Enter