YEREVAN — The Armenian Anti-Corruption Court found former police chief Vladimir Gasparyan guilty of several articles of the Armenian Criminal Code and sentenced to six years in prison, on Tuesday.
He will not go to prison because of the statute of limitations and a general amnesty declared by the Armenian authorities in 2019.
Gasparyan, who served as Chief of Armenia’s Police between 2011 and 2018, was convicted of abuse of power as well as embezzlement and waste of public funds. In particular, the court ruled that he had illegally allowed military personnel to work as drivers and bodyguards for former President Serzh Sarkisian’s two brothers when serving as chief of the Armenian military police and deputy defense minister from 1997-2011.
Additionally, Gasparyan was ordered to pay 200,000 drams as reimbursement for court costs.
In 2021, Gasparyan was charged with six felonies, including abuse of official authority, forgery, large-scale embezzlement, and laundering of over 2.11 billion drams (approximately $4.3 million).
A court in Yerevan also handed shorter prison sentences to Gasparyan’s former deputy Levon Yeranosyan and two other former senior police officers who went on trial together in January 2023. They too have pleaded guilty to the related charges and will avoid imprisonment.
