Yesterday, Judge Varduhie Hovnanyan threw out the slander suit filed by Lernapat Mayor Vano Yeghiazaryan against Hetq reporter Andrineh Torosyan.

The trial dates back to September, 2011 when Mayo Yeghiazaryan sued Torosyan for libel over an August 2011 Hetq article covering a judicial dispute between the mayor and local resident Gevorg Melkonyan.

In her verdict, Judge Hovnanyan also stipulates that Yeghiazaryan must pay the reporter 150,000 AMD as compensation for her incurred legal fees.  

Yeghiazaryan had changed his original financial compensatory demand from 1 million AMD to a mere 1 AMD earlier this year. He still wanted Hetq to issue a public retraction of the “insulting and defamatory” information and publish an apology.