However, during the public hearing, the State indicated that the possibility of filing the appeal for annulment of for constitutional protection (amparo) had arisen again for the victim and for the State, because the decision of the Appellate Court [that dismissed the case], had never been notified to them and, in any case, that court should have delivered a conviction or an acquittal, but not a dismissal. Thus, the State emphasized the failure to exhaust domestic remedies. 17. In relation to the filing of the preliminary objection, the State also indicated that “the Commission had already admitted the case [referring to the initial petitions that had been lodged], before the actions of the Venezuelan courts had concluded. […] The Commission cannot argue that this was due to lack of information from the Venezuelan State because written information [was delivered to it] on March 8, 2005; sent to José Zalaquett[,] President of the Commission. Subsequently, a brief [was sent] to Clare K. Roberts[,] President of the Commission, and, finally, information [was sent] […] on November 25, 2009.” 18. The Commission indicated that, under the American Convention, it has the initial authority to take decisions on admissibility, and these are taken based on the information available at the time. It therefore considered that the Court should accord a certain deference towards the decisions taken by the Commission in this regard. In addition, it considered that, in relation to the case of Eduardo Landaeta, the preliminary objection should be rejected because: (i) the State’s presentation of the preliminary objection was time-barred since it had not communicated with the Commission as regards the admissibility of the petition, and thus the mechanism of the tacit waiver of the right to present an objection came into effect. In this regard, the Commission concluded that the presentation of the objection was inadmissible because it had not been filed at the appropriate procedural moment, and (ii) the Commission also considered that there had been an unjustified delay in the said case, which constituted the exception to the exhaustion of domestic remedies established in Article 46(2)(c) of the American Convention. This was because, in 2007, the domestic proceedings had not advanced beyond the preliminary investigation stage, and are still underway today, even though it is not a complex case. 19. With regard to Igmar Landaeta, the Commission indicated that although the State had “filed the objection of failure to exhaust domestic remedies opportunely,” the Commission had analyzed this argument at the admissibility stage and concluded that the appeal for annulment that the State had indicated should be exhausted did not constitute an adequate and effective remedy, because its only purpose was to contest contraventions of the law and not irregularities in the investigation that, owing to their nature, could not be decided by this remedy. In addition, the Commission took note of the “passive attitude of the Public Prosecution Service as regards appeals,” because it had not filed remedies to contest the acquittal [in the judgment of November 10, 2003], even though it was authorized to do so, and this was an action that could be implemented ex officio, and different contextual factors existed that demanded a more diligent response from the Prosecution. Thus, the Commission indicated that an exception to the exhaustion of domestic remedies had been constituted; specifically the one stipulated in Article 46(2)(a) of the American Convention. 20. The representatives indicated that the objection filed by the State should be rejected because it did not possess either the formal or material requirements to be admissible. Regarding the absence of formal requirements, they indicated that the Court should not re-open the decision on admissibility taken by the Commission, because the State had not argued or substantiated the existence of any serious error or nonobservance of procedural guarantees by the Commission that would have impaired its right of defense. Also, with regard to Eduardo Landaeta, the representatives argued that the State had tacitly waived the preliminary objection of exhaustion of domestic remedies in the petition and that, over and above its tacit waiver, the State had not 7