“The case is still ongoing. After he failed to appear, the judge issued a warrant for his arrest for failure to appear. He is therefore a fugitive from justice. His court case will resume once he is arrested and brought back to our state. The case is not closed and Dino will be prosecuted once he is arrested,” special agent of the Alabama Securities Commission Michael Wilkerson writes in his interview to Iravaban.net, speaking about Vahak Dino Awadisian.
As we wrote earlier, on September 1, the RA Ministry of Defense signed a real estate sale and purchase agreement referring to the Sports and Concerts Complex with NTAA Investment Group Ltd., whose owner and the only shareholder is Vahak Dino Awadisian, a citizen of the USA. It becomes clear from internet sources that he was arrested for being accused of financial fraud. And now it turns out that the criminal case initiated against him is still in process and this person is wanted by Alabama law enforcement agencies.
Michael Wilkerson also mentions that Dino Awadisian has paid a bail of 50 000 USD to the court to remain free till the trial begins. But as he did not appear in the court, that 50 000 USD has been seized irreversibly. The decision on applying bail was made on February 21 last year.
According to the documents available to us, Vahak Dino Awadisian was charged in January 2009 under several articles of Alabama Code for illegal sale and purchase of securities.
The fugitive was in Yerevan on September 1
The sale and purchase agreement of the Sports and Concerts Complex was notarized by Nona Gasparyan, the notary of Nor Nork Notarial District. On the last page of the agreement there is a note made by the notary: “The agreement was signed in my presence. The identities and activity of the signatories, the authorities of the representatives of the legal entity, as well as the ownership rights towards the alienated real estate are checked.”
In her interview with Iravaban.net, Nona Gasparyan said that the signing of the agreement and its validation by the notary is impossible in case of the absence of one of the sides. She remembered that the signatories of the agreement were the Minister of Defense who had authorized another person, and the owner of NTAA Investment Group, who was a US citizen, a man of 45-50 and had tattoos.
This means that the wanted in the US person was in Yerevan on September 1 and signed a sale and purchase agreement with the state.
Where is NTAA Investment Group Ltd. located?
It is natural that we wanted to meet the new millionaire owner of the Sports and Concerts Complex and ask him some questions on this problematic deal.
Still in the Decision 935-A( hereafter, Decision) of the Government by which the real estate was sold to the Company, 22/15 Hrachya Kochar Str. was mentioned as the Company’s address, which turned out to be the address of the former director of the Company.
According to the data of the state register of legal entities, the new address of the Company is 62 Komitas Str., which at the same time is Vahak Dino Awadisian’s home address.
But our inquiry sent to this address was returned with the notes “unknown” and “incomplete address”.
To make sure, we visited this address and found that there are only two organizations on the first floor of the newly constructed building, “Unibank” and “Reso” Insurance Company. The upper floors of the building are residential. Our conversations with the people working in the building did not give any results. No one knew any Vahak or Dino or generally any Armenian from diaspora who lived there on ownership or boarding basis.
The head of the State Register Agency of the Ministry of Justice, Kamo Adamyan affirmed in his reply to our inquiry that according to their data, the address of NTAA Investment Group Ltd. is again 62 Komitas Str.
At the same time he mentioned that according to Article 5, Part 2 of the RA Law “On State Registration of Legal Entities, on State Recordkeeping of Separated Divisions of Legal Entities, Enterprises, and Sole Proprietors”, their agency does not check the validity of the data presented to them and does not bear responsibility for any possible harm caused by it. According to Article 67, Part 1 of the same law, person who presents the documents bears responsibility for the validity of the data in the presented documents.
According to Article 18910 of the RA Code of Administrative Violations, the person is charged a fine of 100 000 AMD for giving incomplete or fake information about his activity to the state body.
We also had information about another residence address, but this information was not confirmed either. Particularly, reparation works were going on in the house by this address and one of the workers told us that the owner of the house is an Armenian from diaspora, a man of 30-32 whose name is Vahe.
By the way, to our question what is the address of NTAA Investment Group, the Ministry of Defense replied that they do not have any information and for the third time they mentioned the old address, 22/15 Hrachya Kochar Str.
Why the Sports and Concerts Complex was sold for 30 million dollars?
We were trying to find the reply to this question for two months. It was incomprehensible why the real estate, which was estimated at 60 million USD by the August 13 Decision 935-A of the government, was sold at half price. And parallel with this we tried to understand how the person, who is under investigation, could pay those 30 million dollars.
The question addressed to the government staff was superscribed to the Ministry of Defense. The Ministry of Defense replied that the cost of the Sports and Concerts Complex was established by the State Property Management Department, while the latter informed that the Draft Decision 935-A was worked out by the Ministry of Defense. The Ministry of Defense in its turn stated that the decision was made by the “State Property Assessment and Inventory Agency” SNCO of the RA State Property Management Department.
But on 09.11.2015 we received a weird reply from the “State Property Assessment and Inventory Agency” SNCO of the RA State Property Management Department, which does not in any way conform to the provisions of the RA Constitution and the RA Law “On the Freedom of information”: they required a properly certified copy of the sale and purchase agreement provided by the Ministry of Defense in order to provide us the requested information..
After receiving such an absurd reply, we had to apply to the RA Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan. But the reply we received from the government staff did not provide any information either.
The important part in this reply was the information that the provisions of the sale and purchase agreement did not enter into force: “The payment is not made. And according to Point 3 of the Government Decision 935-A of 13 August 2015, in such case the provisions of the sale and purchase agreement do not enter into force.”
According to Point 7, the property sales and other payments must be made within the period of 30 working days after signing the agreement. That is, the payment must have been done by October 7.
It is noteworthy that on October 15, the head of the State Property Management Department, Arman Sahakyan mentioned in his reply to Iravaban.net, that there are not yet any agreements on financial investments by the presented investment project. And there is no information that the provisions of the agreement did not enter into force.
According to Point 9 of the Decision, Arman Sahakyan is the authorized person who had to carry out the control over the performance of the duties assumed by the buyer. That is, on October 15 Aram Sahakyan had either hidden the information, or the provisions of the sale and purchase agreement remained valid in the contrary to the government’s reply.
By the way, as it is already known that the provisions of the agreement did not enter into force, the government must take a new decision referring to the Decision 935-A of August 13. However, it seems that the government is in no hurry.
Article 24, Part 6 of the RA Law “On State Registration of Rights to the Property” establishes: “Rights originating from real estate transactions (except one-side transactions) addressed to the establishment, change and transfer of the property shall be subject to state registration within 30 working days from the day of notarization of transaction. In case if the requirement of state registration of rights originating from the real estate transaction is not fulfilled, the transaction shall be deemed invalid. Such transaction shall be deemed null and void.” A similar note was made by the notary who registered the transaction.
“Karen Demirchyan Sports and Concerts Complex SNCO was registered on July 8 by the RA Government, the executive director is Vazgen Asatryan. On November 26 we learnt from the State Register of Legal Entities of the Ministry of Justice that no changes were made since that day and no other data were presented to them either.
Astghik Karapetyan