Epress.am News from Armenia
“Avan” Mental Health Center has filed an AMD 3 million ($6200) defamation lawsuit against former patient Juleta Amarikyan and Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Vanadzor office (HCAV). Amarikyan and HCAV, as stated in the complaint, have insulted and slandered the mental institution.
In addition, the management of the clinic demands that HCAV refute the following statements published in their “Human Rights Situation in Neuropsychiatric Medical Institutions in 2013” report: “…Juleta Amarikyan was forcefully taken to the psychiatric clinic. Lawyer Tigran Hayrapetyan said that for about a month [the woman] suffered from the hospital conditions, did not eat anything for the first 5 days, and only drank water. [Amarikyan] refused to take prescribed medications since the very first day she took them she had problems with her heart and could not sleep all night. On the last day of treatment, they forcefully injected the medication. Juleta Amarikyan suffered during her entire stay at the clinic, she was humiliated and deprived of her dignity. The patients at the psychiatric clinic were constantly beating and insulting each other and stealing each other's food.”
HCAV attorney Arayik Zalyan told Epress.am that the complaint against the human rights organization “is absurd” since HCAV only published what Amarikyan had told them.
The preliminary investigation of the case has been completed and it's been sent to court for further investigation.
Recall, in winter 2014 Juleta Amarikyan was committed to a one-month compulsory psychiatric treatment. The woman, however, insisted that she didn't have mental health problems and she was taken to the psychiatric facility because of a dispute with her brother regarding her apartment.