ArmInfo.On July 29, the Court of Appeal rejected the lawyers' complaint on the illegality of the arrest of former Armenian Ambassador to the Vatican, son-in-law of third president Serzh Sargsyan, Mikayel Minasyan, the press service of the RA State Revenue Committee reported.
It should be noted that Mikayel Minasyan is a defendant in a criminal case being investigated by the Investigation Department of the State Revenue Committee. The former ambassador is accused of illegal enrichment, concealing data on an especially large scale and legalizing property obtained by criminal means. Minasyan was put on the wanted list on March 23, 2020. His whereabouts is unknown.
The SRC reminds that on September 22, 2020, the Yerevan Court of First Instance granted the request of the preliminary investigation body to arrest former Armenian Ambassador to the Vatican Mikayel Minasyan, who is charged under a number of articles of the Criminal Code. However, this decision of the court was appealed by the lawyers in the RA Criminal Court of Appeal. On December 16, 2020, the Criminal Court of Appeal ruled to cancel the decision of the Court of First Instance and sent the case for a new trial to the Yerevan Court of First Instance.
The Yerevan Court of General Jurisdiction discussing the petition to detain M. Minasyan as a preventive measure, considered that there were sufficient grounds for bringing charges against Minasyan well- founded, recognized them as legal and on June 10, 2021 made a decision to satisfy the petition to choose against M. Minasyan a preventive measure in the form of arrest. The aforementioned judicial act was again challenged by M. Minasyan's lawyers in the Criminal Court of Appeal, which, having considered the complaint filed, the objections of the preliminary investigation body and the prosecutor who supervised the preliminary investigation of the criminal case, decided to reject the lawyers' complaint and uphold the decision (on arrest - Ed. note) of the court of general jurisdiction of first instance of the city of Yerevan. The preliminary investigation of the criminal case continues.