Chamber of Advocates condemns disproportionate force used in  detaining of lawyer Alexander Kochubaev

ArmInfo.The arrest of lawyer Alexander Kochubaev and its brutal nature are unacceptable and condemnable, stated Simon Babayan, head of the chamber of lawyers.

He noted that a video of the arrest of lawyer Alexander Kochubaev has  surfaced online.  "It clearly shows how a person accused of  committing a moderately serious crime, not involving violence, is  subjected to demonstrative humiliation by masked law enforcement  officers, who force him to the ground. Thus, the use of  disproportionate force against a citizen, especially a lawyer,  becomes a punitive instrument. This vicious practice deserves  condemnation," Babayan wrote on his Facebook page.

Prominent lawyer and head of the law firm Contra Legem, Alexander  Kochubaev, was detained by security forces on October 16 as he left  the Shengavit Court, where a hearing was underway in the case of  Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan and 17 other individuals accused by the  authorities. Furthermore, pro- government judge Masis Melkonyan had  already ordered the lawyer's pretrial detention for two months.

The pretext for the brutal detention, intended to exert psychological  pressure on the legal community supporting representatives of the  Armenian Apostolic Church, was his post on social media, in which he  made uncensored remarks about the law enforcement system and the  Armenian authorities themselves.  "Investigators, prosecutors, and  judges who have sold their souls to the devil, your punishment will  be from heaven. I pray to God not to forgive you, and you will atone  for your guilt for generations to come," the lawyer shared his  experiences after yet another violent raid on representatives of the  Armenian Apostolic Church. "I was also an officer, and giving up my  epaulettes was the hardest decision of my life. But you can support a  family through honest work, not by swindling your paycheck," he  wrote.

The lawyer also added a couple of obscene expressions, but according  to his colleagues who commented on the incident, none of them fall  under the Criminal Code as non-personal insults.

Apparently, these statements greatly offended his former colleagues,  as Kochubayev had worked in the police for a long time, and those who  are now ready to imprison the entire leadership of the Armenian  Apostolic Church for political reasons.