No pardons in August
By Tatia Megeneishvili
Thursday, August 14
According to the statement released by the Law Enforcer’s Defense League, President Giorgi Margvelashvili was going to pardon prisoners in August. The author of the statement claimed that such a large-scale clemency planned by Margvelashvili would be extremely dangerous for Georgians.
“People convicted of serious crimes would be released, which will be highly dangerous for Georgian citizens,” the statement reads.
According to the statement, the league itself had nothing against amnesty. However, they think that actions fulfilled by the government as an act of humanity must serve public interests and not on the contrary.
“The fact of releasing so many criminals will cause an increase in crime in the country. Anyone who is interested in the issue can address the official structures and demand information. People who were released with amnesty have committed even worse crimes than before, for example, one person threw a bomb at a Gldani district police station, another one raped a 10 year-old child, another killed Genadi Gubeladze with a knife in the Baghdati region,” the statement reads.
The statement informs that according to statistics (27 May 2013), pardoned inmates and prisoners released under the large-scale amnesty in 2012 have committed 512 crimes in total. “We would like to state that this situation significantly causes additional difficulties for the police,” the organization suggests.
Responding to the statement, Chairman of the Parole Commission Zviad Koridze said that Margvelashvili was not going to pardon prisoners in August.
“People are used to the fact that prisoners usually were pardoned on holydays. We know that Saint Mary’s day is on August 28, but the president already pardoned prisoners on July 31, that’s why we do not plan another pardon in the near future,” Koridze said.
According to him, the president pardoned 280 prisoners, 169 of which were released from jails, for the other 11, their sentences were modified.
