Los Angeles Times
August 16, 2012 Thursday
Home Edition
CALIFORNIA;
Court leaks are alleged
by Andrew Blankstein
A federal court employee in Los Angeles has been charged with leaking
confidential court files, the FBI said Wednesday.
Nune Gevorkyan, 35, was accused of accessing sealed court documents
and giving the information to defendants before they were arrested,
officials said. Gevorkyan and her husband, Oganes Koshkaryan, were
arrested Tuesday. They are charged with conspiring to obstruct
justice.
Federal authorities said they believe Gevorkyan looked at sealed
indictments before raids across Southern California in February 2011
that led to the arrests of more than 70 people associated with the
Armenian Power gang. Most of the charges filed in those cases dealt
with white-collar crimes.
One of the defendants, who is seeking a reduced sentence, told FBI
agents that information about the takedown was known to some of those
arrested.
“The cooperating defendant said that, as a result of this information,
he/she fled his/her home the night before the arrests,” according to
court documents.
Officials said an undercover agent “approached Koshkaryan about
getting leaked information.”
“Following this conversation, on two separate occasions, the
undercover provided Koshkaryan with the names of individuals who were
actual defendants in a criminal case filed under seal in federal
court. On both occasions, Koshkaryan then delivered to the undercover
confidential information that had been obtained from the sealed court
records,” according to a statement by the FBI. Electronic records
showed Gevorkyan accessed the sealed records shortly after Koshkaryan
was given the names, the FBI added.