[The judge] could have just as easily ruled that Nika Melia is a “man-eater” or kidnaps children. I don’t know, we watched this madness for hours, said Nika Gvaramia, a leader of the “Coalition for Change” and Nika Melia’s lawyer, to journalists while commenting on the replacement of Melia’s bail with detention.

According to him, Nika Melia is an illegally detained prisoner. Gvaramia also addressed the incident where Melia threw water at Judge Irakli Shvangiradze during the court hearing.

“It’s not just that a person threw water—how do any of us, especially citizens who genuinely need justice, keep our nerves? Politicians are somewhat used to it and know what’s going on, but this is simply unimaginable.

I repeat, this man is now an illegally detained prisoner. Judge Shvangiradze has an illegally detained prisoner. I repeat, not because he misinterpreted a norm or sentenced without evidence—no, he violated the legal requirement that a person in this situation cannot be detained, period!

The fact is the situation, and the fact is that the person was detained when there was still an opportunity to fulfill the legally established requirements,” Gvaramia stated.

He explained that it is absurd to claim that Nika Melia had 29 days to pay the 50,000 GEL bail.

“It’s absurd—29 days for this purpose is equivalent to 3 hours! There’s no difference. If he could have paid in 29 days, he could have paid in 3 hours. The 3 hours were decisive for the judge, not for Melia. For the judge, it’s decisive that until those 3 hours pass, a person cannot be sent to detention, period! It doesn’t matter who thinks what, who says what, and so on. The prosecution knew he wasn’t going to pay the bail—everyone knew it. Then why was 29 days even mentioned? Nothing, it was a technical oversight by the prosecution, then they made up that it didn’t matter, and then, before the deadline expired, they illegally abducted him. This isn’t called justice in any language.

The judge sat there like a bully, making assumptions, asking questions, but I’m not the one to be questioned,” Gvaramia stated.

According to him, Judge Irakli Shvangiradze did not raise any questions about why Melia was detained on May 29.

“He wasn’t even interested in that. He should have at least investigated whether the person was truly deprived of liberty or not,” Gvaramia said, adding that “the oligarchy must fall, otherwise nothing will come of it.”