New criminal case opened against ex-head of Armenia’s Enforcement Service

YEREVAN, August 23. /ARKA/. Armenian law-enforcement authorities have opened a new criminal case against former head of the country’s Enforcement Service Mihran Poghosyan, the Office of Prosecutor General reported today, saying that Poghosyan is accused of legalization of especially large sums of money, the property obtained by criminal means (money laundering), embezzlement of especially large sums of entrusted property (five cases), use of official position to commit embezzlement in large amounts, abuse of official powers (two cases) and exceeding official powers.

In particular, Poghosyan had appointed his relatives and close friends to positions in the Enforcement Service, who did not perform their duties but received salaries. In total, 59.4 million drams of damage was caused to the state in this way.

Also, through his proxies Poghosyan ran several companies - Catherine Group, Best Realty, Kecharis Hotel and Frutimax and patronized them, granting a string of privileges.

Also, in order to legalize $1.2 million in unpaid taxes, generated by these companies, Poghosyan treated the funds as a loan and transferred them to the Catherine Group's bank account, which was used for the company's operational activities, including the repayment of loan obligations.

Also, in 2013, some 166 vehicles were sold by the Enforcement Service at an auction at an undervalued price, as a result of which citizens H.A. and R.H. suffered significant property damage and did not receive $13.5 thousand and $87.5 thousand, respectively.

Poghosyan served as head of the Enforcement Service from 2008 to 2016.

In 2019 Mihran Poghosyan, a former parliament member from the Republican Party of Armenia, and a former Chief Enforcement Officer, had been accused of embezzling at least 64.2 million drams ($132,000) in public funds when he ran the Service for the Mandatory Execution of Judicial Acts.

Poghosyan had been detained in April 2019 in the Russian region of Karelia on an arrest warrant issued by Armenia, but was later released and was said to ask Russian authorities to grant him asylum.

Armenia’s Office of the Prosecutor-General said in August of that year that Russian prosecutors rejected its request to extradite Poghosyan, citing an article of a convention signed by Russia, Armenia and some other former Soviet republics in 1993, which says that a signatory to the convention can reject extradition demands that could damage it sovereignty and national security or contradict its national legislation.-0-