THE CASE OF “SOS” INTERNET SHOW HAS BEEN APPEALED TO THE CIVIL COURT OF APPEAL

The RA Civil Court of Appeals has adopted the complaint appeal into proceeding and appointed a court session on June 21 of 2017 at 11:35 PM.

Haykuhi Harutyunyan, the President of “The Protection of Rights without Borders” NGO and representative of Vilen Gaifejian, “SOS” internet program host, applied to the Civil Court of Appeals to appeal the court decision N EAQD/2551/02/15 in regard to the satisfaction of the claim submitted by the Police representatives Arthur Madatyan and Sergey Zakaryan, on the grounds of demanding public apologize as well as on the violation of material and judicial law.

It should be noted, that on June 2 of 2015 the Republic of Armenia namely RA Police servicemen Arthur Rafik Madatyan and Sergey Seryozha Zakaryan submitted a lawsuit against the host of “SOS” internet grogram Vilen Gaifejian on the demand to subject the latter to civil liability for publically expressing insulting words during the 11^th edition of his program.

By the decision of the Court of General Jurisdiction of Arabkir and Kanaqer-Zeytun Administrative Districts of Yerevan, the demand was partially satisfied therefore rejecting to subject the citizen to civil liability and to demand financial compensation, but satisfying the demand to oblige Vilen Gaifejian to publically apologize to the police servicemen Arthur Madatyan and Sergey Zakaryan.

The policemen considered the part of the “SOS” internet program insulting, during which the conduct of the policemen was being commented, particularly the part when the police servicemen were dragging the mothers of the soldiers killed in peaceful conditions through the whole length of the street near the Presidential Palace.

As a justification to the insulting expressions, the plaintiffs presented the first part of the RA Police news broadcast program, the wearing of the visually same police uniform by the Host during the program, the sentence “dear compatriots, the first edition of the G and simply 7 program is being broadcasted on air”, gesturing with the right hand of the shoulder strap and using the expression “We the Gs and simply the 7s are the protectors, servants and friends of Armenian citizens”.

According to the policemen, the above mentioned expressions are equally referable both to the Police servicemen and to Police system in general.

As stated by the court, the respondent knew beforehand and obviously should have known the insulting characteristics of the expression used by him during the preparation of the internet program, therefore the latter is both personally and indirectly considered an insulting person.