Director of Polyclinic No. 16 Reimburses 15 Million AMD in Damages and Appears Before Investigative Authorities: Prosecutor's Office

In relation to the alleged corruption crimes that took place in Yerevan's Polyclinic No. 16, on May 31, 2018, the Police Department in Kanakerr-Zeytun initiated a criminal case under Article 179, Part 3, Clause 1 and Article 311, Part 1 of the RA Criminal Code, which is being investigated by the Investigative Department of the RA Investigative Committee in the Kanakerr-Zeytun administrative district.

As a result of investigative, procedural, and operational-intelligence actions carried out during the pre-trial criminal proceedings, evidence has been obtained indicating that the director of Polyclinic No. 16, M.S., abused his official position by unlawfully registering the area pediatrician as acting head of the children's department from January 1, 2015, until April 2018, while the pediatrician did not actually carry out the duties of the position, and thus, receiving and embezzling a total of 3,200,000 AMD in salary on a monthly basis.

In a similar manner, the director registered the area pediatrician in the physiotherapist position from December 18, 2014, until May 28, 2018, knowing that the pediatrician was not fulfilling the responsibilities of the physiotherapist role. Using his official capacity, he pressured the pediatrician to hand over each month’s salary of 120,000 AMD, totaling 4,920,000 AMD over 41 months.

He also embezzled 2,214,000 AMD from another citizen who was registered as the head of civil defense from January 1, 2015, to May 18, 2018, while the individual did not perform the duties of this position, taking a monthly salary of 54,000 AMD over 41 months, causing significant damage to the legal interests of the state. Furthermore, evidence obtained during the investigation indicates that in late July 2008, the director personally received a bribe of 500 USD in his office from a citizen and appointed this individual as a nurse in the infectious diseases department.

Moreover, it was discovered that during 2015-2017, the director demanded and received bribes from several staff members of the medical institution in return for sending them to training courses.

In another case, between October 2017 and April 2018, the director did not terminate the employment of the clinic's endocrinologist, who was absent from work and did not perform the duties of the position, allowing him to collect his monthly salary of 54,000 AMD through a bank card for 7 months, which was also embezzled.

It was also determined that using his official position, without a decision from the polyclinic's trade union meeting, he cashed out 524,000 AMD from the polyclinic's trade union's funds, which he then embezzled. On July 19, 2018, a decision was made to involve M.S. as a defendant and he was placed on the wanted list.

On February 1, he voluntarily appeared before the prosecuting authority and provided testimony admitting full guilt regarding the charges filed against him under Article 311, Part 1 (5 episodes), Article 179, Part 2, Clause 3 (1 episode), Article 179, Part 3, Clause 1 (2 episodes), and Article 308, Part 1 (3 episodes). He expressed remorse for his actions, compensated for the material damage, and presented receipts for a payment of 15,000,000 AMD, of which he deposited 11,500,000 AMD with the RA Prosecutor General's Office, and the remainder with the RA Investigative Committee's deposit account.

Considering that the accused M.S. has voluntarily appeared before the prosecuting authority, expressed remorse for his crimes, has no prior convictions, has a permanent residence, compensated for the material damage, and is not a flight risk, the prosecutor issued a decision on February 1, 2019, to lift the detention measure applied to M.S. and substituted it with a signature not to leave.