Nodar Chachua: My family is facing unprecedented pressure - police are demanding that I name people, some of whom are my friends, others I have no business relations with, and some I know only by sight

“My family is facing unprecedented pressure. The main reason my wife is being held captive is to put pressure on me. The police are demanding that I name individuals, some of whom are my friends with whom I have no business relations,” former journalist Nodar Chachua, who has been arrested on drug-related charges, wrote on social media.

According to him, he was threatened and physically assaulted at the time of his arrest, with two senior officials of the Central Criminal Police Department also taking part.

“For more than a month, the Central Criminal Police Department has been holding my wife hostage. It has been exactly 42 days that my family has been subjected to unprecedented pressure. My wife is being held captive despite there being no evidence against her. The main reason for her 42-day detention is to put pressure on me. The Central Criminal Police Department is demanding that I name people, some of whom are my friends with whom I have no business relations; some I know only by sight, while I have no connection whatsoever with others.

Intimidation, threats and physical assault began at the moment of my arrest, at my home, and continued for almost two hours before the search began. Two senior officials of the Central Criminal Police Department were involved. I do not know their names, but I would be able to identify both of them if necessary. The individuals they have named, whose involvement they are demanding that I testify about, and the case they are trying to force me to confess to, make me feel that the officials of the Central Criminal Police Department are not seeking to solve a crime through these Soviet-style methods. Rather, all of this is part of a scenario designed to strengthen their positions, although that scenario has failed.

They could not get a single name out of me, and now they are holding my wife hostage, keeping her over my head like a sharpened axe. According to my information, she is now facing unprecedented pressure, and they are doing everything they can to obtain Lalo’s confession in order to ‘justify’ her detention. They are trying to make her say that she knew about all five grams of the prohibited substance seized during the search of my home. That alone would now be enough for them. But they will not succeed in that either: in the 21st century, holding someone hostage cannot be ‘justified’.

I hope that the time will come soon - and I believe it will certainly come - when both of them will be held fully accountable under the law for the suffering they have inflicted on a 27-year-old woman.

As for the rest, more later,” Chachua wrote.

For reference, Nodar Chachua has been charged under Article 260, Part 1, and Article 260³, Part 4, of the Criminal Code of Georgia (acquisition and possession of cocaine for the purpose of sale, and sale), as well as Article 260, Part 2(b), and Article 261, Part 2(b) (acquisition and possession of the narcotic substance methadone (base) and the psychotropic substance ketamine). The charges carry a penalty of up to 20 years’ imprisonment or life imprisonment.

Nodar Chachua’s wife, former journalist Lalo Beria, has also been arrested. She is reportedly accused of acquiring and possessing narcotics.