Driver Responsible for Death of 1-Year-Old Appeals to Court: Have His Rights Been 'Violated'?

During the days of the revolution, specifically on April 23, we all remember the notorious accident in Saralanj, where a non-registered Opel vehicle collided with a Mercedes-Benz. As a result, the driver and three passengers, including 1 year and 3-month-old Yurik Papoyan, sustained injuries, and the driver of the Opel fled the scene after the accident. The little boy passed away on April 26 without regaining consciousness. The entire country was searching for the driver, who was only discovered and arrested days later.

On December 4, the mother of the deceased child, Tatevik Sekoyan, announced on her Facebook page that the 29-year-old charged with the accident, Sargis Gyulumyan, who had been sentenced to 4 years in prison, was released early due to amnesty. Sekoyan also reported that Gyulumyan’s lawyer, Hamazaspuhi Grigoryan, during the court session made accusations against everyone - even towards the parents who lost their child, except for her client.

However, this story seems to have no end. The Sekoyan family has now received official letters stating that Sargis Gyulumyan has appealed to the appellate court, claiming that his rights were violated by the first-instance court and that he was not released on bail. The Sekoyan family, who lost their child, is indignant: "He has sat for 6-7 months... he took a child's life, killed a person and sat for 6 months, claiming it wasn't a deliberate crime!!! Now you’ll see what those who say, 'It's alright, if he wasn’t punished by law, God will punish him' will say... this is already beyond shamelessness, I don’t even know what to call that 'man'," stated Tatevik Sekoyan on her Facebook page today.