Supreme Court makes verdict into Tennis Courts Special Operation case
Supreme Court makes verdict into Tennis Courts Special Operation case

The Supreme Court of Georgia today made the decision into case of Special Operation carried out at Tennis Courts in Tbilisi on May 2, 2006.

After 6-month-long anticipation, the court upheld the guilty verdict against former high-ranking officials into one of the high-profile cases for the last years.

The arguments, based on which the court rejected putting into production the cassation complaint of former law-enforcers of Criminal Police Department, will become known to the public in three days.

Zurab Vazagashvili and Aleksandre Khubulov were shot by the police special forces unit while the pair was driving in a car near the tennis courts in central Tbilisi on May 2, 2006. The two youngsters were declared as armed criminals by the former authorities back in 2006.

Police claimed they responded with fire only after shots were fired from the men’s vehicle. But families of the two killed young men and their lawyers challenged the official version. Authorities closed the investigation into allegations that police used excessive force for lack of evidence in April, 2007. Probing into the case did not leave any person accountable.

The repeated investigation completely reversed the version officially released 12 years ago. After the change of government in 2012, Georgian Dream Coalition lawmakers said new evidence had emerged after the family of Vazagashvili and its lawyers obtained alternative ballistic examination results, reportedly showing that no shots were fired from inside the car.