6 have occurred within the territory of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, a State party to the Convention. B. Other admissibility requirements 1. Exhaustion of domestic remedies 25. For a petition alleging violation of the American Convention to be admissible, its Article 46(1)(a) requires that the remedies under domestic law be pursued and exhausted in accordance with generally recognized principles of international law. Article 46(2) of the Convention provides that the rule requiring exhaustion of local remedies shall not apply when (i) the domestic legislation of the state concerned does not afford due process of law for the protection of the right or rights that have allegedly been violated; (ii) the party alleging violation of his rights has been denied access to the remedies under domestic law or has been prevented from exhausting them, or (iii) there has been unwarranted delay in rendering a final judgment under the aforementioned remedies. 26. In its initial reply in the instant case, the State wrote that on September 21, 2006 the Public Prosecutor’s Office had filed a request asking that the charges against all the accused in the criminal case initiated at the domestic level be dropped, and that the corresponding court authority now had to deliver its decision on that request, which was still pending. The petitioner, for her part, indicated that the Preliminary Proceedings Court had acceded to the request that the case be dropped and that on November 22, 2010, the proceedings were vacated and the case was ordered sent to another court; she claimed that as of June 2011, the hearing at which the court would rule on the request for dismissal had not yet been held. 27. For purposes of this case’s admissibility and based on the information available, the Commission observes that the criminal process instituted was a suitable remedy; there is no dispute between the parties in this regard. In the Venezuelan legal system, criminal negligence resulting in grievous personal injury is criminalized in the Penal Code, which requires that if the crime is an offense under public law, it must be prosecuted by the State automatically. The petitioner contends that the statute of limitations expired in the criminal case she brought representing her daughter. During that period, the petitioner filed a number of motions and appeals, all calculated to toll the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution and to correct the slow pace at which the authorities prosecuting the case in the domestic courts were moving. 28. The IACHR observes that the petitioner’s arguments on the merits center around the alleged failure to guarantee judicial protection through access to rapid and effective remedies. Specifically, the petitioner is referring to the unwarranted delay in deciding the case involving the grievous personal injury to her daughter resulting from successive episodes of medical malpractice that began on January 28, 1999; she alleges that prosecution of this case was time barred on August 13, 2006, because of the justice system’s failure to act. The Commission observes that from the information supplied by the parties, it would appear that as of the date of preparation of this report, no definitive ruling has been delivered on the outcome of that criminal case. The Commission considers that the petitioner’s allegation fits the exception allowed under Article 46(2)(c) of the Convention to the rule requiring exhaustion of domestic remedies, which provides that the exception applies when “there has been unwarranted delay in rendering a final judgment under the aforementioned remedies.” 29. The Commission also notes that the State has not submitted any information to refute the petitioner’s allegations regarding the unwarranted delay in the criminal case in the domestic courts.