Police Colonel Teimuraz Kalandadze, 38, was appointed as the director of the Kakheti Police Department. Previously citizens accused Kalandadze of inhumane treatment, torture, and threats of rape. During his tenure as the director of the Samtskhe-Javakheti Police Department, his name was associated with the pressure on the independent local publication and the protests organized by the police at the editor’s office.
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Teimuraz Kalandadze was working as commissioner at Kakheti Regional Main Division in 2013. According to media reports, before that, he was an investigator at Gldani-Nadzaladevi police. It was during this period that the Ministry of Internal Affairs issued a severe reprimand to him for his behavior. The case concerns the prisoner's relationship with his wife: “My spouse was arrested for drug trafficking. I was left alone with my 9-year-old son. Kalandadze was investigating my husband’s case. At that time, he worked in the Gldani-Nadzaladevi Division. Kalandadze has been eavesdropping on me and my husband for 7 months and knew that we did not have a good relationship. After my husband's arrest, Kalandadze showed special attention, saying that I was a single mother and he pitied me. He was texting me for seven months. That's how the love affair started. After some time, Kalandadze switched off his mobile phone, his workplace changed and it became impossible to contact him”.
Teimuraz Kalandadze was the director of the Samtskhe-Javakheti Police Department from 2014 to 2017. Citizens have exposed the head of the regional police and his employees to violence.
On February 2, 2015, in the hall of the Akhaltsikhe District Court, Giorgi Kapanadze, who is accused of illegal acquisition and storage of weapons, stated that Teimuraz Kalandadze first kicked him and then beat him with a “Sno” bottle. Forensic-medical examination confirmed that Kapanadze was injured by the repeated impact of a dense blunt object. The Samtskhe-Javakheti District Prosecutor's Office started an investigation into the possible abuse of authority but stopped it due to the lack of evidence of a crime.
During the tenure of Teimuraz Kalandadze as the director of the Samtskhe-Javakheti Police Department, citizen Sergeი Baboyan accused the employees of the department of torture, and inhumane and humiliating treatment. Baboyan was charged with murdering an 80-year-old woman but was acquitted by a jury.
“They started beating me, first on my face and then on my chest with the heel of a shoe, they also hit on my legs. I was bleeding in the face. Then they poured water on my head so that I could regain consciousness. Then they laid me face down on the floor, spread my hands, and stood on my toes. They told me to confess. I said I had nothing to admit because I didn’t know anything. He asked who killed him. I told him, that I didn’t know this too. After that, they took me to the toilet and washed the blood from my mouth. Then they put me on my knees and told me to put my hands down and to walk. I walked like that, then they told me: bark, I barked. I got on all fours, on my hands and knees, walking and barking.
There was an empty half-liter bottle on the table, they threw it on the floor five times and told me to pick it up. I reached out to take it, but they told me to do it not with my hands, but with my mouth. “Be on your knees and take it with your mouth,” quoted the online publication “Samkhretis Karibche” Sergey Baboyan.
The examination confirmed that Baboyan received injuries during the period when he was in the police. The prosecutor's office started an investigation into this case as well, but no one was charged.
One of the defendant's sisters from Akhalkalaki accused Teimuraz Kalandadze of beating and threatening to rape her: “They took me to a room on the second floor. There were about four of them, shouting at me that I knew the location of my brother and should tell them. They said that I should admit it as if I pushed my brother to do it and they would let me go.
The head of the division, Teimuraz Kalandadze, was hitting me on the head with his hand and then kicked me from behind, pulled my hair and tore my clothes. They said that they would take off my clothes and do this and that...
Kalandadze's deputy also hit me and put his shoe near my mouth. The next day I heard that they had brought my 15-year-old boy for questioning and they beat him too and told him to reveal where the uncle was.
“The head of division tore her clothes and threatened her with rape,” – the online publication SKnews.ge published an article with this title about another alleged violence. After publishing the article, the Ministry of Internal Affairs called the editorial office three times and asked to change the title. People sent by Teimuraz Kalandadze addressed the author with the same request. After receiving the refusal, on the instructions of the police, a protest was held at the editorial office for two days.
In 2018, Teimuraz Kalandadze was the head of the Tbilisi Police Department Gldani-Nadzaladevi Division. Koba Kobaladze, the son of the criminal authority, Aleksandre Kobaladze, claimed that the policemen attacked him in order to determine the whereabouts of his father.
According to the statement published on the website of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA), as a result of the investigation, it was established that the police officers of the Gldani-Nadzaladevi Division, two inspector-investigators of the district were present in the apartment of the Kobaladze. The policemen themselves hid the fact of being in the Kobaladze family. “Since the Ministry of Internal Affairs has reasonable doubts about the motivation of hiding the fact of the presence of policemen in the apartment, the strictest measure of disciplinary responsibility was applied to them - both policemen were dismissed from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. At the same time, the direct supervisor of the police and the head of the Gldani-Nadzaladevi Police Department was dismissed. An investigation into the fact of a possible crime committed by the police is underway at the Tbilisi Prosecutor’s Office”.
In 2020, Teimuraz Kalandadze was appointed as the head of the General Inspection Division for Inspection and Investigation of Financial Violations of the MIA. In 2022, he was transferred as the head of the Shida Kartli Police Department.
The position of Kakheti police director became vacant after appointing Giorgi Aladashvili as governor of the Kakheti region.
