Georgia’s jailed, former Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili was sentenced to three years in prison on October 20 for his alleged role in a haunting 2006 murder case. Once the all-powerful muscle of ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili’s administration, Merabishvili was found guilty of obstructing justice in the high-profile death of a 28-year-old banker, Sandro Girgvliani.

The court ruled that Merabishvili used his office to cover up evidence against his employees who abducted and beat Girgvliani, and left him to die. Grigvliani’s death, which followed an altercation in a Tbilisi cafe that involved Merabishvili’s wife, grew into a national scandal that would haunt the Saakashvili administration for years to come.

Merabishvili’s wife, Tako Salakia, and many interior ministry officials were present at the fateful birthday gathering, when Girgvliani showed up with a friend and got into an argument with the group. Several interior ministry officials allegedly later abducted Girgvliani and his friend, Levan Bukhaidze, and took them to the city’s outskirts to beat them. Girgvliani is believed to have died of his injuries or have frozen to death; Bukhaidze escaped.

Girgviliani’s mother, Irina Enukidze, engaged in a long and daring battle with the authorities, accusing them of covering up the murder. Her claims mushroomed into what became, essentially, the first large-scale public pushback against Saakashvili’s administration. With opposition parties and opposition-minded media by her side, she called for the resignation of Merabishvili and the arrest of his wife; both of whom she was convinced had given the order to teach Girgvliani a lesson.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) posthumously upheld part of Enukidze’s complaint and ordered the Georgian government in 2011 to pay the Girgvliani family 50,000 euros (about $72,297) in damages for failing to conduct a thorough and impartial investigation. But the ECHR did not find enough evidence to suggest that the ministry officials involved were acting on their superiors’ orders.   

The case was reopened after Saakashvili’s rivals came to power in 2012. Merabishvili was arrested in 2013 and the charges have been piling up against him ever since. He dismisses them all, and accuses the ruling Georgian Dream coalition of a political vendetta.