Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
07YEREVAN783
2007-06-15 12:47:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Yerevan
Cable title:  

CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM RESTRUCTURES INVESTIGATIVE

Tags:  PGOV PHUM PREL ASEC KJUS KCRM KDEM KTIP HSTC 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO6541
RR RUEHDBU
DE RUEHYE #0783/01 1661247
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 151247Z JUN 07
FM AMEMBASSY YEREVAN
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 5791
INFO RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE
RUEHNO/USMISSION USNATO 0379
RUEHLMC/MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE CORP WASHDC 0075
RUEAWJA/DEPT OF JUSTICE WASHDC
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 YEREVAN 000783 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/CARC
DOJ FOR OPDAT/LEHMANN, NEWCOMBE AND ALEXANDRE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/14/2017
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL ASEC KJUS KCRM KDEM KTIP HSTC
AM
SUBJECT: CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM RESTRUCTURES INVESTIGATIVE
FUNCTIONS IN ARMENIA

YEREVAN 00000783 001.2 OF 003


Classified By: CDA A.F. Godfrey, reasons 1.4 (b,d)

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 YEREVAN 000783

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/CARC
DOJ FOR OPDAT/LEHMANN, NEWCOMBE AND ALEXANDRE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/14/2017
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL ASEC KJUS KCRM KDEM KTIP HSTC
AM
SUBJECT: CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM RESTRUCTURES INVESTIGATIVE
FUNCTIONS IN ARMENIA

YEREVAN 00000783 001.2 OF 003


Classified By: CDA A.F. Godfrey, reasons 1.4 (b,d)


1. (C) SUMMARY: Armenian law enforcement is grappling with a
major restructuring that strips the powerful Prosecutor
General's or "Procuracy" organization of all its
investigative functions and staff, transferring the
investigators themselves into police agencies. The reform is
an excellent one in theory, creating a more Western-style
separation of roles and authorities between police and
prosecutors, and will set Armenian criminal justice on a
sounder footing for the long term. There may be significant
short-term disruption, however, as agencies adjust to the
restructuring. Prosecutors and the PG investigators are
roundly demoralized, at the moment, over this blow to their
previous hegemony over criminal investigations. Police may
be happy to have won new resources, but seem so far
poorly-prepared to assimilate this major influx of staff and
responsibility. END SUMMARY

--------------
MOVING TOWARD A MORE WESTERN MODEL
--------------


2. (U) Armenia's new Law on the Procuracy came formally into
effect May 1, 2007, with many of the provisions in the Law
taking effect at later dates. The most significant change
will be the transfer of all investigative authority from the
prosecutors' offices, both main and local, to various police
agencies: the Investigative Department of the Police, the
State Tax Service, the State Customs Service, and the Defense
Ministry's Military Police. On December 1, 2007, these law
enforcement bodies will begin investigating cases under this
new authority. This Law on the Procuracy is part of broader
reforms which will be completed with the adoption of the new
Criminal Procedure Code (CPC) scheduled by January 1, 2008.
This shift in authority was designed to ensure more

appropriate separation of powers between the body that
carries out investigations and the one that oversees the
investigative process, ideally to create a more transparent
and fair operation of law-enforcement.


3. (SBU) As a result of the reform, the Procuracy (the
prosecutors' organization, virtually a ministry in its own
right) will lose about 60 percent of its staff -- with
investigators moving to different agencies, being converted
into prosecutors, or leaving the system altogether. The
prosecutors that remain will oversee investigations and
litigate cases in court. While some local observers consider
the changes positive, most expect serious challenges in
implementation, due to an untrained national police agency
lacking capacity, and to overburdened prosecutors. The new
reform law only sets forth the general scope of authority for
the prosecutors. The details of this authority will be set
forth in the new CPC. Therefore, the detailed nature of the
reforms is still an open question.

--------------
REINING IN THE PROCURACY
--------------


4. (C) Under the Soviet model, the Procuracy (an independent
agency, headed by the Prosecutor General and comprising
prosecuting attorneys and criminal investigators) was the
dominant institution of the criminal justice system, more
influential than even the judges. To work in the Procuracy,
either as a prosecutor or as a criminal investigator, was
widely considered about the most prestigious job that a young
lawyer could get. After Armenia's independence, and under
Western pressure and assistance, the Procuracy gradually
ceded significant power and prestige to the judiciary, but
retained its dominant role with regard to criminal
investigations. In practice, however, cooperation between
police and the Procuracy has generally been abysmal, with
sharp inter-agency jealousies.


5. (C) The new law's major curtailing of prosecutorial
authorities was a political victory of the former Minister of
Justice Davit Harutyunyan (now chairman of the State and
Legal Affairs Committee of the parliament) over his long-time
policy adversary Prosecutor General Aghvan Hovsepyan.
Nonetheless, publicly Hovsepyan has spoken of his devotion to
the reforms process and the importance of moving closer to
the European models.


6. (C) Gevorg Danielyan -- then the Deputy Prosecutor

YEREVAN 00000783 002.2 OF 003


General, now the newly-appointed Justice Minister -- told us
glumly May 29 that as a result of these reforms the
Prosecutor's Office will lose about 60 percent of its
personnel (down to 250 from about 660),mostly from the
complete transfer of investigators out of the PG's
organization. Danielyan's colleagues, lower-level
prosecutors from Yerevan and the regions, were equally
downbeat about the reform's effects, during the May 29 lunch
at the CDA's residence.


7. (SBU) Final numbers signalling which officers will be
transferred where have not yet been fully worked out. Most
of the investigators are likely to move to the National
Police. Fifty-five investigators from the Military Procuracy
will move to the Military Police under the Defense Ministry.
Other investigators will go to the Tax or Customs
Authorities. A few may be converted from investigators into
prosecutors. (NOTE: PG investigators have typically always
had law degrees as well. END NOTE)


8. (C) Some of the prosecutors whose positions are to be cut
may choose private practice as advocates (defense attorneys),
taking advantage of new licenses obtained recently in the
last advocate bar exam. However, voluntary attrition will
not be enough. The Prosecutor General will still need to lay
off a significant number of employees who will not be
transferred to other agencies. The PG spokesperson Sona
Truzyan explained that a number of retirement-eligible
investigators preferred do that rather than accept transfer,
in order to receive a one-time retirement bonus of over USD
10,000, in addition to their monthly pensions. This one-time
bonus payment upon retirement is a unique feature of the
Procuracy retirement plan that other agencies do not enjoy,
and one that will be lost by all staff transferring out of
the Procuracy to eventually retire out of other agencies.


9. (C) Grisha Mikayelyan, the chief prosecutor for Kotayk
Marz, told us that there is a significant cohort of
investigators (from the high 50s to early 60s in age) who
are too young to qualify for the prosecutorial retirement
package, but above the mandatory police retirement age of 55,
and are therefore ineligible for transfer. Presumably most of
these investigators will be simply laid off without a
retirement pension, but this is not entirely clear yet.

--------------
REFORMS - STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS
--------------


10. (C) According to Truzyan, at this point the reforms
process is still at an initial stage, since many legal and
procedural gaps remain. The Criminal Procedural Code (CPC),
which regulates many of these issues, must be amended in
light of the new Law on the Procuracy's requirements, but
these CPC changes are still being drafted. Truzyan told us
that to make the transition easier the Procuracy may finish
the investigations of its pending cases, but the police will
handle all the new cases. This seems to contradict the text
of the new law. Moreover, Kotayk chief prosecutor Mikayelyan
stated that investigators who are converted into prosecutors
will continue to investigate not only pending cases, but also
newly initiated cases until December 1, 2007.


11. (C) In another reform measure, the Prosecutor General has
approved a Code of Conduct for Prosecutors, a Qualifying
Committee, and a Commission on Ethics (comprised of 7
members, 4 of whom are non-prosecutors appointed by the
President) which will monitor prosecutorial conduct.

--------------
NOT ONLY PROSECUTORS ARE UNHAPPY
--------------


12. (C) Losing a significant swath of its powers and staff,
the Prosecutor General's organization is unsurprisingly
unhappy from top to bottom. Many prosecutorial
investigators are reportedly reluctant to transfer into the
national police agency. We hear that any who can manage it
are pulling strings to win one of the much scarcer positions
in the military police, tax, or customs agencies, rather than
transfer into the national police. These investigators are
reportedly not eager to join the ranks of the very police
whom they had until recently overseen (perhaps even pushed
around) from their position as PG investigators -- previously
deemed far the more prestigious and powerful organization.

YEREVAN 00000783 003.2 OF 003




13. (C) Independent analysts are concerned about the risk of
chaos in the law-enforcement community arising from these
organizational changes. Up until now, the bulk of the
serious criminal investigation work was done by the criminal
investigators working in the various regional prosecutors'
offices or in the office of the Prosecutor General in
Yerevan. The police typically have only investigated petty
crimes or conducted limited initial investigations of more
serious cases before transferring the case file to
prosecutors' jurisdiction.


14. (C) The director of the Advocates Union, Ruben Sahakian,
told us that he is deeply concerned about the new Law because
he thinks the level of professionalism in investigations will
suffer tremendously. He referred to police as "butchers,"
unsophisticated investigators whose crude methods rely
excessively on intimidation. Another widespread concern
among observers is that the prosecutors will be overburdened
without the help of their investigative staff, and which
could lead to cursory oversight over the criminal caseload.


15. (C) A further concern is whether and how long it will
take before working level prosecutors and police develop the
kind of cooperative, day-to-day relationship on case
management that the new structure will require. Under the
previous model, police and prosecutors/investigators only
rarely interacted at the working level; such interaction as
existed -- beyond rote file transfers -- was conducted at
senior levels of the two organizations. The new model will
require police investigators and prosecutors to closely and
informally cooperate without continual recourse to superiors
and other formalistic bureaucratic procedures that define the
Armenian law enforcement relationships.

--------------
COMMENT
--------------


16. (C) This will be a tough transition for Armenian
authorities, but one which is needed and will help Armenia in
the long run. This is an important step in breaking down the
vestiges of top-down, authoritarian justice that the
centralized and all-powerful Procuracy long represented.
Armenian authorities were driven by former Justice Minister
Harutyunian to take this difficult step toward a more
democratic, Western-style model as a leap of faith. It will
be hard in the short term, but will pay important dividends
in the long run, as formal checks and balances in the
criminal justice system will better protect civil liberties
and human rights, and will over time reduce abuse of the
justice system by political masters.

GODFREY
GODFREY