Police Brutality In Armenia

[gamavor]

Fighting Back: Political activist seeks justice for police brutality

 

By Vahan Ishkhanyan

ArmenianNow Reporter

Sept 24, 2004

 

''When they tied my hands behind my back I couldn't defend myself anymore. I was begging: 'Please don't hit below the belt, I can't stand the pain anymore . . ."

 

Grisha Virabyan describes the day he says he stood up for his rights and paid a severe price for doing so.

 

While he was handcuffed, after attacking a policeman who insulted Virabyan's family, police punched and kicked 46-year old Virabyan until a testicle ruptured.Hours after the beating, he was taken to hospital where doctors removed the damaged testicle.

 

As a consequence Virabyan has tried, without success, to bring charges against the Artashat Police Department. He says he was offered money to not pursue the matter in court. He says the matter is not about money.

 

In legal documents, police deny any mistreatment of Virabyan. Doctors at the regional hospital where he was taken, however, say he is by no means the first detainee brought to them from the jail where he was being held, who required urgent care.

 

This is Virabyan's account of the day he says he fought back "in the name of the Republic of Armenia".

 

Grisha Virabyan is a member of the oppositional party, the Peoples Party of Armenia.

 

On April 9, during mass oppositional protests, Virabyan helped organize a march from Artashat to Yerevan (some 40 kilometers).

 

Police stopped a first group of marchers by putting up roadblocks - a common practice during last spring's opposition movement and during the previous year's presidential campaign protests - and sent them back to Artashat.

 

But a second group headed by Virabyan managed to evade the roadblocks and reached Yerevan.

 

Angered by his defiance, police began a search for Virabyan, making daily visits to his mother's home in the village of Shahumyan. A fellow demonstrator warned Virabyan to stay out of Artashat.

 

But on April 23, and on the assurance of an acquaintance who is a police officer that he would not be detained, Virabyan returned to meet with Artashat police, who immediately launched a case against him for failing to obey police orders.

 

Virabyan says that, while interrogating Virabyan, the head of the criminal department, Hovik Movsisyan struck him and said "f*** your mother; f*** your parents".

 

In response, Virabyan grabbed a cellphone re-charger and struck Movsisyan in the eye (the officer later required stitches).

 

Another officer, who Virabyan says was Armen Arsenyan, entered the room and, with Movsisyan, began kicking and beating Virabyan.

 

"I was on the ground and they were beating me," he recalls, these five months later. "I wasn't responding I just wanted everything to be finished soon and I lay down in the corner so that they could only hit my back.

 

"They were hitting and delivering blows directly at my kidneys. Then they left and another policeman entered and told me to sit down. I stood up to sit but Armen entered the room and didn't allow me to sit. He kicked me below my belt. The pain was terrible and I fell down. I stood up again and he again kicked me and then for a long time he was kicking me below the belt.''

 

Virabyan says Deputy Head of the Police Department of Ararat Region Ashot Karapetyan squared the cruelest accounts with him.

 

''As soon as he entered the room he spat at me and hit me below the belt. After the first blow I gripped the collar of his coat and said: 'If we meet in a friendly company you will feel ashamed for what you did'."

 

Karapetyan ordered another officer to handcuff Virabyan.

 

Virabyan begged the policemen to stop the beating because he was in too much pain.

 

"You're faking it," Karapetyan retorted.

 

"He began kicking me in the testicles and on my side," Virabyan says. "His shoes were sharp-toed. I was trying to crouch so that he couldn't hit me there but I couldn't."

 

ArmeniaNow requested an interview with Movsisyan, who refused, saying it was not appropriate for a policeman to give a media interview. He did confirm that his eye had been injured.

 

In his testimonies Ashot Karapetyan denies that Virabyan was hit and he says that he was only questioned.

 

''I treated him very gently. I never cursed him or shouted at him,'' the officer wrote.

 

But another letter to the court contradicts claims that Karapetyan is a "gentle" investigator.

 

Araik Vardanyan, an inmate at Nubarashen Prison wrote a letter to the court stating that he had confessed to crimes that he didn't commit, merely to avoid being beaten by Karapetyan and another officer.

 

"In the winter, those two butchers tried several times to involve me in accusations by means of beating and other cruelties," Vardanyan wrote. "They even drove me to the point that I slit my wrists."

 

Natasha Voskanyan, of Sevan, also told ArmeniaNow that she was called as a witness to Nor Nork police department (where Karapetyan formerly was assigned) and was slapped several times by Karapetyan and that he burned her with a cigarette to get her to give testimony as a witness in a murder case.

 

While Virabyan was being held at the police station, the Prosecutor's Office of Artashat was initiating a criminal case based on the fact that policeman Movsisyan sustained a bodily injury.

 

Meanwhile, police called for a doctor to give Virabyan a sobriety test. The head of traffic police, Avetik Harutyunyan, held a device to Virabyan's face and told him to blow into it. Virabyan told the officer he was not drunk.

 

"Then he suddenly hit my face with his fist and again held out the ampoule. I repeated I'm not drunk and he hit me again," Virabyan says. "It was repeated four times. Finally he turned and was going to leave the room but he turned back and again punched me in the testicles."

 

Doctor Anahit Gasparyan signed a document saying that Vriabyan was under the influence of alcohol.

 

But the doctor told ArmeniaNow that she was unsure about the analysis because the measuring device was old and unreliable.

 

The color (that indicates the level of alcohol) changed only slightly from Virabyan's response. She asked if the device was old. Police said they did not know. Her assessment of Virabyan's sobriety was based mainly on the reaction of his eyes to tests. But, later, when she found out that he'd been beaten, she says his response was consistent with that of someone who'd received a blow to the head - and not, necessarily, that of a drunk man.Only a blood test could correctly determine whether Virabyan was intoxicated, the doctor says. But adds that she didn't demand that the police let her give one because "You cannot impose your rules onto members of law enforcement . . . It made no difference whether he was drunk or not, in any case it wouldn't have any influence on his future.''

 

Virabyan was jailed. In the evening he began experiencing severe pain. Gasparyan was called again and, upon seeing Virabyan, ordered that he must immediately be taken to hospital.

 

At midnight, surgeon Ruben Liloyan examined Virabyan at the Artashat hospital and found that he had chest and testicle injuries.

 

''I was worried about his chest,'' Liloyan says, "because it could have been a threat to his life. Unfortunately, I had no roentgen film and I couldn't X-ray him. Using clinical methods we ascertain that there was an ordinary injury and there was no threat to his life. Concerning his testicle, we decided to conduct an echogram in the morning. It was blackened and enlarged. Pain made him moan.''

 

Virabyan was taken back to the isolation ward. The doctor says he didn't insist that Virabyan be kept in hospital, because he thought they would take Virabyan home.

 

Liloyan also says he didn't imagine that Virabyan's testicle had ruptured because such injuries are very rare. But: "Unfortunately there was a strong blow.''

 

Back at the jail, Virabyan again was overcome with pain and was taken a few hours later back to the hospital.

 

Doctor Gagik Hambardzumyan found that Virabyan's scrotum was filled with blood and determined that the testicle must be removed.

 

It was the first time when someone with such an injury was taken to hospital from police, Hambardzumyan says. However, people with other injuries - especially to the stomach - are often taken to the hospital from the police station, the doctor says.

 

On the day of the operation, Virabyan's uncle Sashik Virabyan informed Artashat Prosecutor's Office about the incident and later wrote an application to the Prosecutor General of Armenia, to the Chief of Police, and to the Prime Minister asking that charges be brought against the police. He received no answer. In contrast, charges were brought against Virabyan on May 3. He says he was told the charges would be dropped if he would not put up a defense.

 

''I was offered money several times and asked not to defend myself," Virabyan told ArmeniaNow. "But I rejected their offer as I'm not going to sell injury inflicted on me for money. I'm going to do everything so that policemen will be punished."

 

An investigation was launched, and on August 30, the Prosecutor's Office quashed the case, writing in his decision that Virabyan had suffered enough physical injury to assuage any guilt for the charges brought against him. Republic of Armenia Ombudswoman, Larisa Alaverdyan, visited Virabyan while he was in hospital and twice appealed to the Prosecutor's Office on his behalf, calling for an objective investigation.

 

''If a man entered the police station and he was healthy, and then in the morning he was operated on, then it means he was subjected to improper and cruel treatment,'' Alaverdyan says.

 

It was after Alaverdyan's second letter that the case against Virabyan was quashed. Now the rights' attorney wants to see an investigation into the behavior of police in the case.

 

''. . . Everything should have been brought to light," Alaverdyan says. "However, investigators from the Prosecutor's Office didn't pay attention to everything that concerned Virabyan. Now when the case was quashed the road is open and Grisha Virabyan can appeal and a new case can be initiated.''

 

Virabyan's lawyers have sent numerous applications to the Prosecutor General and various courts for initiating a case against Artashat police. All have been denied.

 

Editor's note: Through a grant from the World Learning Foundation, ArmeniaNow reporter Vahan Ishkhanyan is researching a book on recent cases in which citizens have been arrested in relation to political events. The cases highlight episodes in which police used force or pressure against members of oppositional political parties and participants in last spring's protests. This is the first in a series of articles resulting from Ishkhanyan's research.

 

 

PS: Now before some of you reply to this with an excuse that "shit happens everywhere" let me clarify something. Shit happens in USA - a multy racial, multy ethnic country with archaic democratic system. Shit happens in Africa, Middle East and Russia. Shit happens in some places in Europe. USA is a 270mln. people nation, Russia is 170mln, Africa is just a tribal society and the Middle East is at least few centuries behind the civilized world.

How about Armenia? The beacon of the Civilization - European and Asian. Armenia, the country with 1700 years of Christianity and rich cultural and historical legacy.

Some time ago the Swedish Interior Minister was late for work 15 minutes, driving by himself his own Peugeot to work and submitted his resignation. How far Armenia is from such mentality? 100 years, 200 years?

 

Aiskan hedamenatzadz azg enk, vor p'nav chem meghatrel anonk vorong chen uzer Hye m'nan!

[Harut]

http://hyeforum.com/index.php?showtopic=89...indpost&p=96701

 

the same applies here

Edited October 18, 2004 by Harut

[Armen]

The police act like barbarians, however, I think the leaders of the opposition are to be blamed most. None of the has the gutts to go all the way. As I mentioned earlier this is a crisis of leadership. A member of People's Party gets beated like that and Demirchian does nothing. What kind of leader that is?

 

Well, what can I say about the police...

[Anoushik]

I'm not trying to defend those monsters that are the Armenian police but I think one has to be pretty stupid to let oneself get that badly beaten by the police. Armenians have to realize that yes, even though they are Armenians (we are special), they still cannot take force to the police. That idiot not only was the first to hit the police (and so badly that the officer had to get stitches) but when he was asked to take the breathalyzer he refused and insisted that he wasn't drunk. When the police asks you to do something you do it. Armenians have to learn and understand that.

 

I really don't like ArmeniaNow. Their stories are so biased and incomplete and just stress what they think should be stressed in the story. In this case it's obviously showing how the police beat one powerless man that his testicle raptured. I would've cared more about this if they also wrote what caused the police to become that violent in the first place.

[Twilight Bark]

... I think one has to be pretty stupid ...

or pretty drunk

 

That idiot not only was the first to hit ...

That drunken idiot

[dianjan]

I think that the blame is all in the police, and noone else. Police everywhere think that just because they have the power, they can do what ever they want. It's not only in Armenia or USA, but it happens everywhere. I had a friend, who at 28 was beating to death by Moscow police, because he talked back to the cop. In hind sight, he probably should've been quite, but the police everywhere are taking it to the extreme.

I hope that Grisha will win the case against those cops, and those cops get reprimanded for their actions.

[Nakharar]

I don't think that we should be too coy about that policeman at all. There is a thin line between enforcing the law and acting as a thug and in this case that policeman really crossed the line. However if we are going to be apologetic for every bad thing that happens in Armenia and try to find excuses we won't progress one inch.

[Arpa]

I have not read all the posts in this thread but it gives me the chance to say what I have been itching to say for quite sometime. Particularly when we were talking about LTP

 

Armenians must learn to respect native authority!!

 

Be they the president, the judge, the poilice and even the lowliest of the lowly burreucrats. That way, maybe they will also respect us.

 

The Ottoman days are over!!

Abdul Hmaid is not our Sultan (president).

 

Why is it that when the CHP stops us on the highway or the NY or Mass. Trooper, we address them as "sir" and we call them "officer". Why is that when the Syrian ostikan stops us we address them as "sayed(lord) bolis/shrta" and we call the Turkish police "effendi"!!??

 

Yes SIR!!

 

Of course SIR!!

 

I won't do it again SIR!!

 

Is it because the Armenian vostikan has a name like Armen Ter Karapetian? After all! Who is this Armen anyway? Is not he that khllot lakot that we used to play with in the mud? What does he have over us?

What does the CHP have over us?

What the Arab police have over us?

What does the Russian police have over us!!??

What does the Turkish police, whose name ia Mehmet Abdul-Hamid have over us?

Can we even raise a finger on those latter ones?

Who?

Us?

The meek and lowly lambs!?

We are such a loyal and law abiding citizens in foreign lands!!

But when it comes to "khllott" Levon (TP), and ostikan Armen!!??

 

We turn into lions!

 

Ketseh Aryuts Mher!!

 

Who assigned them over us anyway!!??

 

How are they better than us??!!

 

They're no better than you and I??!!

 

Would it make a diffrence if the ostikans of Yerevan were to adopt names like Mehmet, Ali, Jose, Brian and Boris??

Edited October 18, 2004 by Arpa

[Armen]

Armenians must learn to respect native authority!!

style_images/master/snapback.png

 

Arpa, what about the native authority learning to care and respect Armenians?

[Twilight Bark]

Arpa,

While I cannot disagree with your wish that we learn to take one another more seriously, or as seriously as we take outsiders, I think there is a lapse in your logic. You are expecting a drunken man to do the right thing, while ignoring the real problem in this particular example: abuse and feeling of impunity by the authority (which in fact partially ties into the very same issue). Your concern is a valid one, but placed in the wrong thread, and on the wrong example.

 

There is no excuse for the behavior of the police. None whatsoever.

[nairi]

I agree with TB. The police man went way too far. Maybe I'm too idealistic on this. I feel that "authority" should be trying to keep the peace instead of making things worse. I wouldn't have cared if they had kept him in custody (under humane circumstances) and maybe even pressed charges against him once he sobered up, but to beat to near death is beyond my understanding. I hear cases of abuse and torture are still very common in Armenia. Makes me sick to the stomach.

[Arpa]

Arpa,

While I cannot disagree with your wish that we learn to take one another more

 

When I wrote the above I was well aware that the subject needed a separate treatment. How about a thread about RESPECT to (native Autority) under a subject topic under "Culture" and see when and where we have respected our own authority vs the alien oppressor.

 

  You are expecting a drunken man to do the right thing, while

 

I will leave it here inviting the readers to search more than a thousand stories about Rodney King, and thousands of other similar cases, and police brutality, when the entire police force of a state descended on a "drunken idiot", and all this in this the most civilized land of the US of A.

 

Your concern is a valid one, but placed in the wrong thread, and on the wrong example.

 

Yes. I know. Let us start a separate thread.

 

Edit: fixed quotes.

Edited October 18, 2004 by nairi

[Anoushik]

Wait a minute, you guys don't know whether he was drunk or not. Why are you finding excuses for him? Just like we shouldn't defend the police neither should we defend that person's behavior.

 

I think that the policemen and Grisha Virabyan were just filled with hatred towards each other - one side representing the government and the other representing the opposition. Especially in Grisha's case he was so involved with hating the police and authority that he lost his reasoning to stop doing what he was doing and do what he was told. They have been encouraged to hate the other side by their respective leaders. There is a good expression in Armenian: "grgrrel". Unfortunately these people become victims because the leaders who fueled this hatred in the first place just turn around and leave.

[Twilight Bark]

Wait a minute, you guys don't know whether he was drunk or not. Why are you finding excuses for him? Just like we shouldn't defend the police neither should we defend that person's behavior.

 

I think that the policemen and Grisha Virabyan were just filled with hatred towards each other - one side representing the government and the other representing the opposition. Especially in Grisha's case he was so involved with hating the police and authority that he lost his reasoning to stop doing what he was doing and do what he was told. They have been encouraged to hate the other side by their respective leaders. There is a good expression in Armenian: "grgrrel". Unfortunately these people become victims because the leaders who fueled this hatred in the first place just turn around and leave.

style_images/master/snapback.png

Alright. Maybe he wasn't drunk. Maybe his poor judgement was caused by innate idiocy genetically or societally endowed, rather than induced by intoxication. What difference does it make? Police's job is to enforce the law when people with ill will or bad judgement break the law. Being a policeman involves accepting a risk. If their expectation is that law-breakers (and we don't know if he did break the law) will be fully cooperative, nice people, they have no business wearing their uniforms. If every time an apprehended person does something they don't like they are going to fly off the handle like that, they need psychiatric treatment. If they can't keep their cool because some poor idiot does something hotheaded, they should not be alowed to become policemen or remain in the force. As simple as that.

 

Idiots will be idiots, and they don't have rules of conduct. The important thing is to make sure that the police act like the real thing, rather than a bunch of thugs.

Edited October 19, 2004 by Twilight Bark

[Sasun]

In case anyone has doubts - the Armenian police systematically torture 99% of the arrested people. This has been the case since Soviet times, and under both Armenian presidents. There is no particular political signature.

Please note that I am using the term "torture" as the accepted term, it does not mean people are overly tortured for sadistic reasons to get pleasure. It simply means that whoever and whenever gets arrested and doesn't make quick phone calls (if any) to appropirate connections, then getting beaten up is inevitable. It is a routine method of pre-treatment before any formal interrogation will go on. After the arrested gets pre-treated in such a way the formal procedures follow. It does not matter if the person is innocent or not, man or woman, he/she will not avoid getting this pre-treatment. It maybe a few abusive words, a few strikes accompanied with appropriate wording for psychological effects, or if there is resistence then there is more beating and more abuse. This is the routine. Now in case of this person who not only was defiant but also aggressive, you can easily predict what would normally follow without knowing the story. This is the reality, and if we are going to have European aspirations let's keep this in mind too. As it was pointed above we are a few hundred years back in this dimension.

 

I once had a conversation with a young Armenian professor of law who had the chance to teach a Human Right course to a group of middle level police officers in Yerevan. These policemen had no idea at all what human rights are. When asked what they thought they didn't know what to say, but one of them was slightly more educated than others saying that human rights means that a man has the right to breath, eat and drink.

 

To keep it short, we need fundamental changes in the law enforcement agencies, not just some superficial reforms.

[Armen]

To keep it short, we need fundamental changes in the law enforcement agencies, not just some superficial reforms.

style_images/master/snapback.png

 

That will not help Sasun. It comes from the top. Its the unchalleneged will of the ultimate power. People need to challenge their will. How wise were the American forefathers when they allowd guns in the hands of people. Maybe now the U.S. don't need this but then it was crucial to lay the basis of a country of law.

People need to frighten the authority. Not necessarily a revolution or toppling of Kocharian regime. That may be counterproductive.

Edited October 19, 2004 by Armen

[Nazarian]

That will not help Sasun. It comes from the top. Its the unchalleneged will of the ultimate power. People need to challenge their will. How wise were the American forefathers when they allowd guns in the hands of people. Maybe now the U.S. don't need this but then it was crucial to lay the basis of a country of law.

People need to frighten the authority. Not necessarily a revolution or toppling of Kocharian regime. That may be counterproductive.

 

This rings as true in 2004 as is now.

 

[arziv]

The policemen discharge their duty as competently as they can. Sometimes there are excesses, it is unfortunate. They react according to the circumstances . But it is a healthy sign that the police have the upper hand and not the criminals. Imagine countries where the police hide behind locked front doors-- for fear of the criminals -- . There are a lot of people that are disdainfully of authority, in almost every case. These are witting or unwitting troublemakers, and the police need to teach these civilian scoundrels a salutary lesson. Sometimes they may have a few ribs or bones broken. That is the price one pays for an uncivil remonstrance and for not knowing one's place. At least in armenia the police force is a force and a conspicuous force at that.