Committee pauses bid to dismiss convicted judge
Wednesday 11th November 2026 on 14:15 in
Lithuania
Lithuania’s parliamentary Committee on Legal Affairs and Law Enforcement has delayed a decision on dismissing Court of Appeal judge Viktoras Kažys, who was convicted in a corruption case. The committee will return to the matter at a future meeting, LRT reported Wednesday.
The committee heard from the president’s chief legal adviser, a representative of the Judicial Council and Kažys before taking a break. President Gitanas Nausėda has proposed dismissing the judge for tarnishing the judicial profession and following his conviction. The Judicial Council also recommended dismissal on both grounds, presidential adviser Andrius Kabišaitis told the committee.
Kažys asked lawmakers to wait until the Supreme Court rules on his case. He said a first-instance court had acquitted him and argued that the Supreme Court could overturn the Court of Appeal’s verdict. He has asked the Supreme Court to suspend the verdict’s enforcement, he said.
On September 14, the Court of Appeal found Kažys guilty of promising to accept a bribe and fined him 12,500 euros. He has been suspended from his duties for eight years. Kažys denies the bribery allegations and says the evidence does not support them, adding that some evidence was concealed.
Kažys also criticised the 500-page verdict, saying it relied on assumptions rather than legal arguments and facts. He alleged that a substantial part of it had been written using artificial intelligence and that it drew examples from testimony given in a Malaysian football arbitration case.
Kabišaitis said the Supreme Court would review how the law had been applied, not reassess the evidence, and that the Court of Appeal had established the facts. Committee member Ignas Vėgėlė questioned whether Kažys needed to be dismissed before the Supreme Court’s decision. Kabišaitis replied that the president had to respond after receiving the conviction.
The president appoints and dismisses Court of Appeal judges with the approval of the Seimas, Lithuania’s parliament.