The decision to arrest Aram Vardanyan, who is known as a Yerevan neighborhood “authority,” has been appealed. His lawyer Yervand Varosyan told about this to Armenian News-NEWS.am.

The Investigative Committee of Armenia had informed that a decision had been made to arrest Vardanyan as a pretrial measure and that he had been declared wanted. He is accused of plotting the robbery committed by Emir Aramyan in 2016, plotting the kidnapping of the very same Aramyan in 2019, and committing attempted murder against him on March 4, 2020.

According to the Investigative Committee statement, on March 5, Vardanyan's nephew A.V. was charged with kidnapping, and S.K.—with robbery.

At around 2:40am on March 5, hundreds of police officers entered the houses of Aram Vardanyan and his relatives at the same address. As a result, Vardanyan's son and two others were apprehended and two more were detained, one of whom is his nephew and the other—a neighbor.

The search at Aram Vardanyan’s house continued during the day yesterday. Investigators conducting the search had presented the search warrant to his lawyers. According to this court order, they were looking for weapons and ammunition in Vardanyan's house; but not finding such items, they took video recordings related to his personal life.