2024-05-01 11:11:54
This pre-trial investigation was launched in 2017. on November 20, when model Dovilė Didžiūnaitytė fell to her death from the common balcony of a hotel in Klaipėda, located on the 14th floor. The part of the investigation into the circumstances of the young girl’s death was terminated without establishing that she was murdered or driven to commit suicide.
In January 2020, the case with the indictment was transferred to the court, charging Aivaras Miltenis with raping the girl, and Ričardas Pinikas with illegal distribution of narcotic and psychotropic substances, causing physical pain to the victim and influencing the witness.
In October 2022, the Klaipėda district court, after examining the criminal case, found A. Miltenis guilty of rape and sentenced him to a real prison sentence of 2 years and 6 months.
At the same time, the convicted R.Piniks was acquitted by the court for affecting the witness and causing physical pain, but was found guilty of illegal possession of narcotic or psychotropic substances with the aim of distributing them. He was also sentenced to 2 years and 6 months in prison.
The Klaipėda District Prosecutor’s Office appealed this sentence to a higher court. in 2024 February 1 with the verdict, the Klaipėda District Court partially satisfied the prosecutor’s appeal, and rejected the appeals of the victim D. Didžiūnaitytė’s representative, the convicted A. Miltenis’ defense attorney, and the convicted R. Piniks.
The verdict of the court of first instance was changed – the fact that he committed the criminal act while under the influence of alcohol was recognized as an aggravating circumstance of the convicted A. Miltenis and this had an influence on the commission of the crime.
However, in the court of appeal, the prosecutor’s appeal regarding the acquittal of R. Piniks for violence in the hotel room against D. Didžiūnaitytė, causing her physical pain and affecting the witness of the case, so that he concealed the true circumstances of the incident during the interrogations regarding the possession of narcotic and psychotropic substances and violence against the girl and wrongly imposed (too lenient) punishments for R. Pinik for illegal possession of narcotic and psychotropic substances with the aim of distributing them, and for A. Milteni – for rape.
On Tuesday, the deputy chief prosecutor of the Klaipėda District Prosecutor’s Office, Aurelijus Stanislovaitis LAT, filed a cassation complaint, requesting that this case be returned to the appellate court for re-examination, since the court of cassation cannot find a person guilty.
The cassation appeal of the Prosecutor’s Office states that the acquittal of R. Piniks on the basis of Article 140, Part 1 of the Criminal Code and Article 233, Part 1 of the Criminal Code is unfounded, because in this part, fundamental violations of the Code of Criminal Procedure were committed in court and the criminal law was improperly applied.
The cassation complaint regarding too lenient sentences was not submitted to the two defendants, because according to the law, this is not a subject of cassation proceedings and these issues were finally resolved in the courts of the first and appellate instances.
According to A.Stanislovaitis, the deputy chief prosecutor of the Klaipėda District Prosecutor’s Office, there are no specific rules in the Criminal Code regarding the determination of the amount of imprisonment, which would allow calculating the specific amount of punishment within the limits of the sanction that the court must choose in a specific case.
When determining the amount of the punishment, the court takes into account the individual circumstances of each case, describing both the person who committed the criminal act and the nature and danger of the specific act. In this case, there is no reason to state that the courts would have inappropriately applied these rules when determining the amount of the prison sentence.
2024-05-01 11:11:54