was a member of the RCA labor union. 103 In addition, on March 15, 16 and 17, 1995, UNSITRAGUA issued a public statement and sent two urgent telegrams to the Ministry of the Interior, expressing its concern for the possible relationship between Mr. Gómez Virula’s disappearance and his participation in the RCA labor union. These announcements prove that, as of that date, the State was aware that the alleged victim was missing. 58. What has not been proved is that the State knew or should have known that there was real and imminent danger for labor unionists prior to the report of Mr. Gómez Virula’s disappearance. Consequently, the Court considers that the State did not fail to comply with its obligation to ensure the rights to life, personal integrity and personal liberty of Mr. Gómez Virula. 59. The foregoing does not mean that the State did not have an obligation to investigate the alleged victim’s disappearance with due diligence once it became aware of this. The analysis of this aspect will be made in Chapter VII-2. 60. Regarding freedom of association, the Court notes that its alleged violation is based on the State’s responsibility for the violation of the rights to life, personal integrity and personal liberty. Taking into account that the Court has not found the State responsible for the violation of those rights, it considers that the State did not violate the right to freedom of association of Mr. Gómez Virula. VII-2 RIGHTS TO JUDICIAL GUARANTEES 104 AND JUDICIAL PROTECTION105 A. Arguments of the Commission and of the parties 61. The Commission argued that the criminal investigation was not opened based on the reports of the victim’s disappearance, but rather following the discovery of his corpse and that this constituted a violation of the right to judicial guarantees and judicial protection. It emphasized that the State had not presented information on the preparation of an official record of the discovery of the body or the handling of the crime scene, or of the autopsy that was performed. It indicated that, “according to the information provided by the parties, neither the approximate time nor the place of death had been recorded. Similarly, the [Commission] note[d] that although it was indicated that Mr. Gómez Virula's body showed signs of trauma and bruising, no forensic examination of this was made, nor were those injuries adequately described; moreover, no mention was made of the forms, patterns or indications that might establish whether those injuries were pre- or post-mortem.” The Commission considered “that the request to archive the case because of the existence of different versions of what happened without having exhausted the basic investigative procedures, much less all the possibilities to clarify those discrepancies, [was] incompatible with the obligation to investigate with due diligence.” It also indicated that “[b]earing in mind the ambiguity of the information as to whether the investigation was officially archived, the Commission considers that the more than 21 years that have elapsed since the complaint was filed regarding the disappearance and subsequent death of Mr. Gómez constitutes an excessive time.” 62. The representatives argued that the State was responsible for the violation of Mr. Gómez Virula’s rights to judicial guarantees and judicial protection owing to the “total absence of procedures, actions and measures to search for him before the discovery of his body,” and Cf. Communication of March 14, 1995, signed by the Deputy Head of the Criminal Investigations Department of Guatemala addressed to the prosecutor of the Public Prosecution Service (evidence file, folio 464), and Report filed before the Ombudsman on March 14, 1995 (evidence file, folio 412). 103 104 Article 8 of the American Convention. 105 Article 25 of the American Convention. 17