ATTEMPT TO DEFEND MURDERER
Suzan Simonyan
Lragir.am
24/08/2011
The incident of last November in one of the southern military units of
NKR is the past year’s most bloody and fantastic thriller in the life
of our army. The wire of headphones of one of the senior sergeants was
ripped. He utters a word of abuse, and one of the conscripts, Manvel
Hazroyan, 19, thinks the sergeant meant him. In 5 hours he kills 4 and
wounds 3 from a machine gun. In the end, he shoots from the machine
gun twice at himself. This is the official story. Later in hospital,
at the intensive care unit, Manvel Hazroyan confesses that he was the
killer. “One of the victims was outdoors. He killed him. Then he went
downstairs. It was dark. He opened the squeaking door and opened fire.
One person went unnoticed. He left the room barefooted. He set to run.
Hazroyan chased him and shot him dead. Later the guy’s brother asked
him why he killed his brother. He said I didn’t know it was your
brother,” tells Edmond Marukhyan, Hazroyan’s attorney.
However, Hollywood wouldn’t pick up this story because it has a
serious shortcoming. The motive of murder is not in place. The
American audience would never believe that one would kill a squad
for a word of insult, and do it after thinking for 5 hours. Those
7 should have insulted him so deeply, at least raped him. However,
Hazroyan would not tell anything.
In hospital, Manvel was interviewed and confessed in the absence
of his attorney. Earlier Vova Gasparyan, the deputy minister of
defense, met with him. It is not known what they talked (this episode
is missing in the records). It is not known what other officials met
with him. His father, Armen Hazroyan, arrived at the hospital but was
not allowed to talk to his son privately. At the intensive care unit,
7-8 soldiers guarded Manvel, and even the doctors felt uneasy when
they were asked about the health of the patient.
The father’s impression was that his son was intimidated, and he did
not believe his confession was true, and on the same day he shared
his doubts with reporters. Later the young man told his attorney he
didn’t realize what he was doing at the time of killing. “Sometimes he
is calm, sometimes he breaks down. If he took a word of abuse uttered
in the air for him, if he was mad with everyone, it means this person
has an unhealthy perception. It means he is not sane. If he is not
sane, why was he called up? If there is no such perception, it means
something is wrong with the investigation,” Marukhyan says. On August
3, when Judge Hamlet Davtyan voiced his verdict of life sentence,
Hazroyan again lost control. On hearing his sentence for life, the
young man threw the plastic bottle with water at the judge and hit
him. The officers of Shushi jail handcuffed him and beat him in the
court room.
Edmond Marukhyan tried to help his defendant but he was beaten too.
When everyone calmed down, the attorney asked the officers why they
beat him too, they said because he defends Hazroyan. These crimes
were committed in front of the judge but charges were brought only
against the person who threw the bottle.
Hazroyan reported violence against him to the Prosecutor General’s
Office. The report was redirected to the Office of the Prosecutor
General of Karabakh. There is no response. The Chamber of Advocates has
hung a condemning decision on the wall. Attorney Melania Arustamyan
says the Chamber of Advocates took every possible step to defend
Marukhyan but neither the steps nor the decision is published,
considering the Karabakh issue.
The head of the security of Shushi remand prison who was among
those who beat Hazroyan asked him in the presence of his attorney,
“Do you complain that we beat you?” Hazroyan refused to complain.
“How could he say yes, the head of security used violence? If he did,
after the investigator left, they would beat him to death in Shushi
jail,” Edmond Marukhyan says. He appealed the decision of the Court
of First Instance as he found a great number of violations during
the preliminary investigation and trial, so the verdict cannot be fair.
“Manvel Hazroyan was interrogated in the absence of his attorney.
After getting his confession, they engaged an attorney who signed
the records but he was not a member of the Chamber of Advocates of
Armenia. In other words, according to the law of Armenia, it was not
an advocate. The investigation was built on this evidence which they
took with violation of the law. The real motive of the crime is not
known. A sane person would not take up a machine gun and kill his
friends for an indirect word of insult,” says Edmond Marukhyan.
He filed a petition to assign a forensic examination by a psychologist
and a psychotherapist but his petition was dismissed.
“Since there is no evidence, conclusion of forensic examination
obtained in accordance with the law that he is insane, the punishment
cannot be considered fair. You cannot sentence a person for life like
this. We think it is unacceptable to use the forensic examinations
and Hazroyan’s confession as evidence,” the attorney says.
He was labeled “traitor” for a legislative discrimination between NKR
and Armenia. Hazroyan has been transferred to Armenia. He is at the
Nubarashen penitentiary. Every time Marukhyan meets his defendant,
he asks: “Did you think, huh? Do you have anything to say?” But he
keeps silent.
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