Samvel Karapetyan faces baseless charges, lawyers claim

Businessman and philanthropist Samvel Karapetyan has been charged with public calls for seizure of power, strongly rejected by his legal team as baseless and politically motivated.

Karapetyan was arrested late last night following a raid at his villa in Yerevan. His arrest came shortly after he publicly expressed strong support for the Armenian Apostolic Church under attacks from the Armenian leadership. Karapetyan warned that if politicians failed to resolve the situation, “we will intervene in the campaign against the church in our own way".

"The charges are absolutely unfounded," his lawyer Armen Feroyan told reporters on Wednesday.

He said that law-enforcement authorities are expected to petition the Avan District Court to place Karapetyan in pre-trial detention.

Lawyer Liana Gasparyan highlighted the questionable nature of the case. She noted that the alleged offense classified as a medium-gravity crime is typically punishable by a fine or community service, not imprisonment

“The mere attempt to detain someone for this type of offense shows the process is entirely unlawful,” she stated, vowing to appeal the case through all legal channels.

Another member of the defense team, Ruben Hakobyan, revealed that more than 50 people were detained near Karapetyan’s residence, many held beyond the legal time limit. He alleged excessive force and violations of the inviolability of Karapetyan’s home.

“From the initiation of proceedings to the use of coercive measures and the filing of charges, the entire process is blatantly illegal,” Hakobyan said. “As Mr. Karapetyan himself put it, this is absurd, nothing more.”