KP Deputies Have Made a Request for Tonoyan's Release on Personal Guarantee: Who Are They

A request has been submitted to replace the measure of restraint of former Minister of Defense David Tonoyan with a personal guarantee. The guarantors for Tonoyan are members of the National Assembly faction of the 'Civil Contract' party, Kristine Poghosyan, Vilen Gabrielyan, known by the nickname 'Boat Rowing,' and Aram Zaveni Sargsyan.

As previously reported, today, a court session was held at the Court of General Jurisdiction of Yerevan, presided over by Judge Manvel Shahverdyan, regarding the case of former Minister of Defense David Tonoyan, Chief of General Staff of the RA Armed Forces Artak Davtyan, former Deputy Chief of General Staff Stepan Galstyan, and others including 'Patron Davo' (David Galstyan).

During the preparatory phase of the court hearing, both the issue of the court's self-rejection and the rejection of the prosecuting attorney were discussed. The court rejected both motions and proceeded to discuss the measures of restraint for the detained defendants. According to David Tonoyan's attorney Sergey Hovhannisyan, the court attempted to discuss the issue of measures of restraint immediately after the examination of the self-rejection question; however, the defense objected and demanded that the issue of the prosecutor's rejection be discussed.

Nevertheless, the court dismissed the prosecutor's motion for rejection, stating that such a procedure is not provided by the Criminal Procedure Code at this stage, thereby depriving the defense of the right to reject the prosecutor, after which it moved on to discuss the issue of measures of restraint.

It should be noted that among those detained in this case are David Tonoyan, Stepan Galstyan, Avetik Muradyan, David Galstyan, and Artyom Hambardzumyan. Today, the court examined the measures of restraint for all defendants except for Stepan Galstyan, whose measure will be discussed tomorrow at 11:00 a.m.

The prosecuting attorney has requested to leave the measure of restraint of detention unchanged for the defendants. Attorney Sergey Hovhannisyan reported that the prosecutor formulated his position, stating that the grounds for detention during the preliminary investigation continue to exist, and he has nothing further to add.

“We began to defend against what we can infer. No substantiated reasoned motion was presented by the prosecutor regarding why they should remain in detention. We assume this pertains to the obstacle and to this direction we presented our counterarguments,” noted Hovhannisyan.

The defense has also requested that the measure of restraint of detention for the defendants be replaced with other measures. Specifically, the lawyers for David Tonoyan have requested to apply personal guarantees for Tonoyan, with personal guarantees provided by National Assembly members Kristine Poghosyan, Vilen Gabrielyan, and Aram Zaveni Sargsyan. The lawyers for David Galstyan, Avetik Muradyan, and Artyom Hambardzumyan have requested that bail be applied as a measure of restraint for them.

We inquired whether David Tonoyan had made a statement at the court hearing, to which the attorney replied that, in essence, he insisted on the submitted motions and additionally provided a position regarding the continuation of the measure of restraint for other individuals involved in the case.

It is worth recalling that a criminal case was initiated in the Investigative Department of the NSS regarding alleged abuses in the process of acquiring military ammunition, specifically concerning the acquisition of defective, unfit rockets. Charges have been filed against seven individuals in connection with this criminal case, including former Minister of Defense David Tonoyan, Chief of General Staff Artak Davtyan, former Deputy Chief of General Staff Stepan Galstyan, and businessman David Galstyan, known as 'Patron Davo', involved in arms supply.

According to preliminary investigation data, the senior officials of the RA Armed Forces and Ministry of Defense abused their official positions, agreeing with the owner of 'Moston Engineering' company to settle an obligation owed to the Ministry of Defense by privatizing 'Neutron GAM' and 'Bagavan' LLCs. In 2018, they accepted and acquired a total of 4,232 units of expired military ammunition previously rejected for technical inadequacy and stored in the RA Ministry of Defense.

The investigation indicates that the aforementioned persons adjusted the technical specifications of the contract to conform to the type of goods actually delivered to the Ministry of Defense, stating false information regarding the delivery of military ammunition in factory containers to the central warehouse of military unit N of the Ministry of Defense.

Moreover, the specified military ammunition was purchased at nearly double the price of previous acquisitions from the same batch, resulting in embezzlement of a particularly large amount of 2,277,323,840 AMD, equivalent to 4,655,200 USD. David Tonoyan has been charged under the 3rd part of Article 179 of the RA Criminal Code, Artak Davtyan under the 3rd part of Article 375, Stepan Galstyan under the 3rd part of Article 375 and the 1st part of Article 314, Avetik Muradyan, Vladimir Babayan, and Artyom Hambardzumyan under the 3rd part of Article 375 and the 1st part of Article 314, and David Galstyan under the 3rd part of Article 178 and the 1st part of Article 325 of the RA Criminal Code.

It is noteworthy that the court has made a procedural decision to examine the case in a closed session. The defense lawyers and the defendants present at the hearing opposed the case being examined in a closed session, insisting on a public hearing; however, the prosecuting attorney had earlier filed a written request to the court to examine the case non-publicly due to the presence of state secrets in the case materials.