Journalist Mzia Amaghlobeli Sentenced to Two Years in Jail as Court Reclassifies Charges

Batumelebi and Netgazeti founder Mzia Amaghlobeli has been sentenced to two years in jail after the court’s last-minute decision to reclassify criminal charges from attack on a police officer to “resistance, threat or violence” against an official. While still deemed unfair by Amaghlobeli’s supporters, the verdict is seen as a slight retreat from the Georgian judiciary’s previously uncompromising stance on protest-related cases.

The ruling comes after Amaghlobeli spent seven months in pre-trial detention, where she ended up for slapping Batumi Police Chief Irakli Dgebuadze during a tense night of protests and arrests. The case had attracted widespread scrutiny, with observers describing both the criminal charges and the lengthy pre-trial custody as punitive measures aimed at silencing the journalist.

Amaghlobeli was initially charged with assaulting a police officer under Article 353 prima of the Criminal Code, carrying a penalty of four to seven years in prison, which was reclassified on August 6 to a charge under part 1 of Article 353 Criminal Code involving “resistance, threat or violence against a protector of public order or other representative of the authorities”, punishable by a fine or house arrest for a term up to two years, or by imprisonment for a term of two to six years.

Batumi City Court Judge Nino Sakhelashvili delivered the ruling on August 6, as supporters gathered in and outside the courtroom in the coastal city to stand with Amaghlobeli.

“Whatever decision you make today, I want you to know that I consider myself a winner,” Amaghlobeli told the court in her closing remarks on August 4.

Many had traveled long distances to attend the trials, including Amaghlobeli herself, who is held at Rustavi’s fifth penitentiary facility, a six-hour drive from Batumi, where she was arrested and tried and where she has worked for many years. Among the crowds who attended three final hearings from August 1 to August 6 were family members, colleagues, activists, politicians, diplomats, and Georgia’s fifth President, Salome Zurabishvili.

“The regime is paralyzed – too cowardly to free Mzia Amaghlobeli, too weak to convict her,” Zurabishvili wrote on X after the verdict. “It hides behind delays, hoping to survive. But her strength exposed their fear. This isn’t justice. It’s a dying authoritarian system.”

The journalist had firmly rejected the plea deal floated by prosecutors during previous hearings, arguing that accepting it would mean admitting that a slap constituted an attack. “I won’t and can’t sign this plea bargain, because what happened was not an attack, and portraying and painting a slap as an attack is evil,” the journalist said, calling the offer “deeply offensive” and likening it to “being buried alive.”

Originally from Chvana village in Shuakhevi, Adjara, Amaghlobeli co-founded the local media outlet Batumelebi in Batumi with Eter Turadze in 2001. In 2010, Batumelebi established another outlet, Netgazeti, with a focus on nationwide reporting. Since then, the two outlets have become key media sources on developments in Georgia and Adjara, with a broad focus on critical coverage of politics, social issues, and corruption, among others.

A case to be “talked about by generations”

“Mzia Amaghlobeli’s case is a mirror of how the government abuses power, how the charge fails to serve its purpose, and how it tries to present the victim as the abuser and the abuse as the victim,” Maia Mtsariashvili, Amaghlobeli’s lawyer, told the court at the end of nearly eight hours of concluding remarks on August 1, describing the case as the one “to be talked about by generations.”

The journalist was placed in pre-trial detention following the tense night of arrests on January 11–12 in Batumi. She was detained twice that night — first after placing a protest sticker on an outbuilding of the Batumi Police Department, and again shortly after her release, after slapping Batumi police chief Irakli Dgebuadze during a tense standoff.

She was charged with assaulting a police officer over the latter incident, a charge under Article 353 prima of the Criminal Code carrying a penalty of four to seven years in prison. The journalist’s defense has argued that the charges of assaulting a police officer were disproportionate to the act committed, citing, among others, Georgian judicial practice not classifying a slap as such an attack.

Amaghlobeli went on a hunger strike following her arrest, which she ended on February 18, after 38 days. In June, the journalist’s lawyers raised concerns that the defendant was on the verge of losing her eyesight, with her already poor eye health further deteriorating since her detention amid a lack of medical examination and care.

Amaghlobeli also recounted inhuman treatment on the part of Dgebuadze while in custody, including verbal insults, menacing the journalist with what she said were attempts at physical attacks, spitting in the face, as well as being restricted from using the bathroom or being provided with drinking water.

Several experts testified to the court, effectively dismissing the versions of serious pain or injury inflicted on Dgebuadze’s cheek as a result of a slap. That included prosecution expert Givi Chkhartishvili, who denied identifying any “objective sign” of damage on Dgebuadze’s face following a slap in his testimony.

The defense also argued that police witnesses had given false testimony and criticized prosecutors and investigators for their unwillingness to question Amaghlobeli. Meanwhile, the court refused to admit testimony from multiple defense witnesses, the lawyers said.

Throughout her detention, Amaghlobeli has been fined twice on administrative charges, in what her lawyers argued were two fines on the same act of putting a sticker, and a result of a separate fabricated administrative case to justify her initial illegal detention on the sticker incident.

Amaghlobeli’s defence has repeatedly raised concerns about Georgian Dream officials, including GD Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, claiming Amaghlobeli was carrying out a “specific instruction” to diminish police. The journalist’s lawyers motioned to question Kobakhidze as part of the trial, but the request was denied.

International scrutiny

The journalist’s case has drawn widespread domestic and international attention. Support for her release has come from a broad spectrum of individuals and groups, including academics, politicians, and even conservative figures such as Irma Inashvili, leader of the nativist Alliance of Patriots party, whose views typically differ sharply from those of the journalist.

The European Parliament has repeatedly called for Amaghlobeli’s release in its resolutions, and European diplomats routinely attended the court hearings.

The TrialWatch initiative of the Clooney Foundation for Justice (CFJ) has been monitoring the trial, describing it as a case that “has come to symbolize the growing concern over the shrinking space for free expression in Georgia.” The initiative identified several key issues in the proceedings, including the prosecution’s failure to present evidence that a slap constituted a violent act; the authorities’ failure to investigate the journalist’s complaints of ill-treatment; and pressure tactics and reputational attacks by the prosecution, including urging Amaghlobeli to plead guilty and referencing unrelated past incidents to build their case.

On June 26, the Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association (GYLA), a local human rights group, announced that the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) had begun reviewing the appeal in Amaghlobeli’s case, roughly two months after GYLA submitted the application.

The organization said the Court indicated the case may be classified as an “impact case,” one that could significantly influence or change human rights law. The application covers the period from the opening of the investigation through to Amaghlobeli’s pre-trial hearing, and lawyers have challenged the legality of both Amaghlobeli’s detention and the custody as a pre-trial measure, and alleged political motivation, among others.

The verdict comes as no police officer has been held accountable for documented abuses during violent dispersals. Critics also note that pro-government thugs and affiliated figures often escape punishment or get away with lenient penalties, while Amaghlobeli and others arrested over protests face harsh sentences.

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