The court has declined to admit one of the public statements made by former Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili into the case files as admissible evidence.
At today’s hearing, which addressed the admissibility of evidence, defense attorneys petitioned to introduce one of the former prime minister’s letters into the case materials as evidence. The letter in question refers to former head of Georgia’s State Security Service, Mamuka Mdinaradze.
As Judge Lela Kalichenko explained, the evidence failed to satisfy the criteria for admissibility. According to Kalichenko, when information is in the public domain and displays signs of a potential crime, reviewing it and initiating an official response is the exclusive purview of investigative authorities.
As a reminder, as part of the new criminal proceedings against the former prime minister, testimony against Garibashvili was provided by former Defense Minister Juansher Burchuladze and his relative Vasil Mkheidze. According to their testimony, in exchange for state procurement contracts, corresponding guarantees, and general patronage from Irakli Garibashvili, Burchuladze personally handed 750,000 lari directly to Garibashvili from a 1,500,000 lari bribe he had received, keeping the remaining 750,000 lari for himself.
As a result of these actions, the state sustained particularly large-scale material damage totaling 6,985,255 lari, alongside a significant infringement of public interests.
The Prosecutor’s Office charged the former prime minister under subparagraphs “a” and “c” of Part 2, and subparagraph “e” of Part 3 of Article 338 of the Criminal Code of Georgia, which entails bribe-taking on a particularly large scale by a group of persons while holding a state-political office, an offense punishable by 11 to 15 years of imprisonment.
Irakli Garibashvili has already been convicted of particularly large-scale money laundering. Under a plea agreement, he was sentenced to 5 years in prison and ordered to pay a fine of 1 million lari.