On June 3, 2019, the subsequent trial session on NGNGO beneficiary transgender person S.P.’s criminal case took place at Avan Residence of Yerevan Court of General Jurisdiction.
NGNGO attorney Ara Gharagyozyan filed a petition to replace S.P.’s detention with a signature bond as preventive measure. R. Manukyan, the prosecutor on the case had no objection to the petition, as he stated that the accused had displayed good behavior during the investigation of the case. As a result Judge H. Manukyan satisfied the defense lawyer’s petition and the preventive measure of S.P. was replaced from detention into signature bond. Thus S. P. was released at the courtroom.
NGNGO attorney Ara Gharagyozyan noted that this was an expected decision that should have been made long ago as his defendant S. P. had been held in detention illegally. The attorney had previously filed a petition on replacing the preventive measure of detention with a bail as well. The petition was satisfied by the court but S. P. remained in detention as he couldn’t afford to pay the assigned amount of bail – AMD 5․000․000.
NGNGO president Sergey Gabrielyan is convinced that this only the beginning of achievements and New Generation Humanitarian NGO will be consistent in pursuit of fair trial of each of their beneficiaries’ cases and in pursuit of exclusion of discrimination.
Prehistory of the case․
Transgender women A.A., S.P. and A.S. were at Zakyan Street in Yerevan when A.Z. approached them in black BMW car. The girl sitting on the car’s passenger seat took photos of transgender women and swore at them. The latter swore back. A. Z. got out of the car and hit S.P., then attacked A.S. and tried to choke her. Afterwards A. Z. and R.H. sat back into the car and drove away. Later police officers arrived at the place. As a result S. P. was included in the case as accused instead of victim. On September 22, 2017 criminal case was launched against trans people by Article 258 (4) of RA Criminal Code. S. P. was subjected to cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment and torture during his detention. These crimes were also reported by the attorney.
S.P. was hold in detention for about two years.