Father Keeping 8 Children at Home Detained
By Gvantsa Gabekhadze
Tuesday, August 14
Amiran Devnozashvili, who has kept his eight children at home in Georgia’s mountainous Svaneti region, has been detained for compulsion.
The court has already sent him to pre-trial detention.
Devnozashvili ’s lawyer says that the man does not admit to the crime.
The lawyer says that the case consists of 13 volumes, is large-scale, and mostly social servants speak negatively against his defendant.
Georgia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs announced in January this year that they launched the investigation of the case concerning alleged hostage of wife and eight children by a Georgian man in the country’s eastern, mountainous Svaneti area.
Georgia’s private broadcaster Rustavi 2 had offered the media coverage of the story, in which Svaneti resident Devnozashvili refused to allow his wife and eight children to leave home, get an education, communicate with others, etc.
The eldest “child” is a 21-year-old girl and the youngest-7-year-old boy.
The children never could play with other kids or speak with them, neighbors say.
“We have never seen anything similar in the region,” locals told the media.
Devnozashvili told the Rustavi 2 that he aims to “avoid negative influence of the modern world” for his kids.
He assured that he was capable of educating his children better than the current educational institutions.
The man admitted that he had problems with the local police because of his intentions to his family, but he could do what he wanted.
Social service employees and the school leadership also stated that they “had done their utmost” to persuade Devnozashvili to change his mind, but all their attempts turned fruitless.
Local NGOs have condemned the fact and stated that Devnozashvili’s action was unlawful.
