September 11, 2002 this additional information was submitted to the State with a request for any further information to be presented within 30 days. The Commission received additional information from Mr. Chaparro dated September 26, 2002, which was transmitted to the State for its observations. There has been no further communication from the State. On June 23, 2003, Mr. Chaparro requested a hearing on admissibility to be held during the next period of session of the Commission. The Commission decided not to grant the request for a hearing due to the large number of hearing requests. 9. The Commission received the second petitioner’s (Mr. Lapo) complaint on April 14, 1999. On March 22, 2002, the Commission received additional information from Mr. Lapo. On March 31, 1999, the Commission received additional information from Mr. Lapo’s wife. On March 22, 2002, the Commission received additional information that the case had been dismissed by the Superior Court and that Mr. Lapo had been released from detention Mr. Lapo sought reparations of US$ 5 million for the alleged arbitrary detention that had lasted one year, six months and 11 days. On June 7, 2002 the Commission communicated the petition to the State and requested a response within two months. On October 2, 2002, the Commission received the response from the State, which was transmitted to Mr. Lapo on October 17, 2002 with a request for observations to be presented within 30 days. On November 25, 2002, the Commission received Mr. Lapo’s observations, which are dated November 14, 2002. These observations, in turn, were communicated to the State on November 27, 2002. There has been no further communication from the State. III. POSITIONS OF THE PARTIES A. Position of Mr. Chaparro, the first petitioner 10. On November 15, 1999, at approximately 4:00 p.m. Mr. Juan Carlos Chaparro Alvarez was arrested at his home, in the presence of his wife Mrs. Cecilia Aguirre de Chaparro and his brotherin-law, Carlos Aguirre M., by a plain-clothes policeman who did not want to identify himself and who was accompanied by a large number of subordinates dressed in combat uniforms, who were heavily armed with machineguns and automatic weapons. These police officers were accompanied by Judge Guadalupe Manrique Rossi, the 12th Criminal Judge of Guayas, who declined to present an arrest warrant, stating that it was not necessary and that her presence was sufficient. The petition alleges that Mr. Chaparro was requested, by means of deceit, to accompany them to a police station in order to make a declaration in regards to “a drug found in some Styrofoam containers.” Not having any relation with the drug that was found, Mr. Chaparro willingly agreed to accompany them, thinking that he could provide them assistance since he was the owner of a company, the Plumavit Factory, which produced Styrofoam products in Ecuador. 11. The morning of the same day that he was arrested, unbeknownst to Mr. Chaparro, his Factory was illegally and arbitrarily searched, and the police proceeded to detain all the workers and employees whom they found working extra hours on that Saturday. No arrest warrants were shown, and Mr. Freddy Lapo, the Production Manager, requested Captain Peralta to produce a search warrant. The Captain, pulling out his pistol, retorted that “with this and 400 kilos of drugs in the airport I have the right to search where I want”. Mr. Lapo, two mechanics and the man in charge of the warehouse, were still in prison at the time Mr. Chaparro’s petition was presented, the others had been released after 10 days in detention. 12. Mr. Chaparro, and the workers from his factory, were taken to the police station, where they were locked in individual cells and held incommunicado for five days. They were not even permitted to make a phone call during that time. During those five days Mr. Chaparro was interrogated in the police office without the presence of his lawyer. The petition states that this fact can be corroborated by Dr. Marcelo Santos Vera, former Minister of Government of Ecuador, and who having learned of his situation came to see him with his wife and Mr. Joaquín Martínez, a friend of the family. The following day, the declaration was taken in the presence of a lawyer who