The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal of trade union activist Afiyaddin Mammadov against his sentence of eight years in prison. The defense expressed disagreement with the court’s decision.
Afiyaddin Mammadov was detained on September 20, 2023. The activist stated that he was being persecuted because of his trade union activities and denied the charges of assault, saying that he himself was beaten by this man, Safar Huseynov. A prosecution witness changed his testimony in court, admitting that he did not see Mammadov stabbing the victim.
On April 9, the Baku Court of Appeal completed its consideration of the appeal against Mammadov’s sentence, Sara Rahimova, a member of the board of the alternative trade union confederation “Working Platform”, told a “Caucasian Knot” correspondent. “Unfortunately, the court of appeal did not create the necessary conditions for Afiyaddin to defend his rights. Presiding judge Faig Ganiev interrupted his speech with comments such as: “Don’t turn the trial into a scene,” “This is not the place to express emotions,” “Speak to the point,” despite the fact that Afiyaddin was talking about the context of the criminal case, his persecution for defending workers’ rights, and the falsification of evidence. Nevertheless, Afiyaddin managed to complete his speech, which he summed up with the slogan: “Long live the workers’ struggle!” When Afiyaddin wanted to hand over the text of his speech to lawyer Zibeyda Sadygova, the guards forcibly took the papers from him and took him back to the aquarium cage,” Ragimova said. However, according to her, after protests from Mamedov and the lawyer, the guards handed over the sheets of paper with the activist’s speech to the judge, and he said that the defendant’s speech would be included in the case materials. At the same time, the court left the sentence against Mamedov unchanged, added Ragimova.
As in the court of first instance, our petitions were not satisfied
Attorney Sadygova confirmed that the appellate court did not conduct an objective investigation.
“As in the court of first instance, our petitions were not satisfied. Moreover, the appellate court did not take into account our reference to the need to comply with the instruction of the Plenum of the Supreme Court, according to which, if there is no evidence of the commission of a crime out of “hooligan motives”, then the article “Hooliganism” should be removed from the accused. There are even precedent decisions. In the case of Mamedov, there should have been a similar approach, the court should have at least mitigated his punishment by removing the charge under Article 221.3 (hooliganism committed with the use of weapons) of the Criminal Code. Of course, we will file a cassation appeal to the Supreme Court and insist on an acquittal,” said attorney Sadygova.
She recalled that Mamedov was found guilty on all counts, and in particular, under Article 126.2.4 (intentional infliction of serious bodily harm by a generally dangerous method), Articles 221.3 (hooliganism committed with the use of weapons) and 228.4 (illegal arms trafficking). An employee of the Baku Court of Appeal confirmed the information about the decision in Mamedov’s case. Representatives of the prosecution were not available for comment.