{"id":7771,"date":"2017-03-14T17:51:09","date_gmt":"2017-03-14T17:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/media.am\/woman-fined-for-hindering-journalists-work-during-elections\/"},"modified":"2017-03-14T17:51:09","modified_gmt":"2017-03-14T17:51:09","slug":"woman-fined-for-hindering-journalists-work-during-elections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/newsroom\/2017\/03\/14\/7771\/","title":{"rendered":"Woman Fined for Hindering Journalist\u2019s Work During Elections"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Lori District Court of First instance handed down a fine of 700,000 AMD (about $1,370 USD) to Mariam Avagyan for impeding a journalist\u2019s professional activities and damaging her electronic equipment on the day of the Vanadzor City Council elections.<\/p>\n<p>The court has confirmed that on Oct. 2, 2016, the day of the municipal elections, at Vanadzor\u2019s no. 30\/47 polling station, Mariam Avagyan grabbed AraratNews.am journalist Shoghik Galstyan\u2019s Samsung Galaxy J7 mobile phone and deliberately threw iton the ground, breaking it.<\/p>\n<p>The court decided that the phone, as a journalistic tool for covering the election process, lost its intended purpose, and that the journalist suffered material damages.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"360\" src=\"\/\/coub.com\/embed\/f8r6h?muted=false&amp;autostart=false&amp;originalSize=false&amp;startWithHD=false\" width=\"640\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">News outlet Hetq recorded on video the act of Mariam Avagyan breaking the journalist\u2019s phone and then saying, \u201cIt\u2019s good that I did it.\u201d Another person among those gathered outside the polling station was complaining that the journalist \u201chas been filming since morning.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iL6iYquslcg\" width=\"853\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The Court found Avagyan guilty of the crime stipulated by Criminal Code Article 149.1 (in part \u2014 \u201cHindrance to the implementation of the authorities of the election or referendum commission or initiative group, candidate or his proxy, observers, mass media representatives, the authorized person of the party [or association of parties]\u201d), sentencing her to a fine of 700,000 dram, as well as depriving her of the right to hold a position in any state or municipal agency, or to be a member of an election commission, proxy or observer, for one year.<\/p>\n<p>In court, Avagyan pleaded guilty only to causing material damages, which she subsequently compensated. She did not plead guilty to the charges under Criminal Code Article 149.1.<\/p>\n<p>Shoghik Galstyan, in conversation with Media.am, said she is satisfied by the court\u2019s decision. \u201cMariam Avagyan compensated me for the property damage she caused; that is to say, she gave me the same phone I had. I hope that this and similar incidents will contribute to there being, I don\u2019t want to say entirely none, but at least fewer repeat incidents.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the punishment was proportionate, and for that reason, we won\u2019t be appealing the ruling,\u201d said the journalist\u2019s attorney, Grisha Balasanyan.<\/p>\n<p>AraratNews.am editor Mariam Margaryan likewise considers the court ruling legally commensurate. \u201cI\u2019m happy that the ruling happened at this time, ahead of the [upcoming parliamentary] elections. Hopefully, during these elections no one will obstruct the work of media representatives, and we will follow up so that the perpetrators in such cases are punished.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"rteright\" dir=\"ltr\"><strong><strong>Gagik Aghbalyan<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Lori District Court of First instance handed down a fine of 700,000 AMD (about $1,370 USD) to Mariam Avagyan for impeding a journalist\u2019s professional activities and damaging her electronic equipment on the day of the Vanadzor City Council elections. The court has confirmed that on Oct. 2, 2016, the day of the municipal elections,<a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/newsroom\/2017\/03\/14\/7771\/\"> Read the full article&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7758,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsroom","author_posts-gagik-aghbalyan"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}