Fresh criminal charges brought against ex-president’s chief bodyguard and his wife

YEREVAN, November 21. /ARKA/. Fresh criminal proceedings have been instituted against Vachagan Ghazaryan, former chief bodyguard of Armenia's ex-president Serzh Sargsyan, Ghazaryan’s wife and the director of the Yans restaurant owned by the Ghazaryans, the General Prosecutor's Office said.

All the three are accused of large-scale extortion with a threat of violence; they have been formally charged and the travel ban was chosen as a preventive measure. The preliminary investigation of the criminal case in being handled by the Special Investigative Committee.

According to the General Prosecutor's Office, in June 2017, Ghazaryan, his spouse and the director of the Yans restaurant extorted 40 million drams (about $100,000) from the restaurant's chief accountant, threatening otherwise the latter and his son with physical assault.

The chief accountant was forced to sell his gold jewelry, borrow money from relatives, sell his apartment and give the money the Ghazaryans.

Earlier, in 2020, Ghazaryan was already a defendant in a number of criminal cases, including on charges of abuse of power, which resulted in grave consequences through negligence, tax evasion and illicit enrichment.

Ghazaryan was first arrested in 2018, less than two months after the velvet revolution, on charges of illegal enrichment, false asset disclosure and tax evasion. A court in Yerevan freed Ghazaryan on bail a few months later, after he and his wife agreed to pay 2.9 billion drams ($6 million) to the state budget.

In October 2019, the couple completed the $6 million payment and the criminal charges against them were dropped.

A person suspected or accused of an alleged crime is considered innocent until proven guilty by a court decision, which has entered into legal force, according to the procedure prescribed by the Armenian Criminal Procedure Code. --0--