79
Moreno, Mayela León Rodríguez, Richard Alexis López Valle and Zullivan René Peña
Hernández from exercising their professions.
B.ii
Mental and moral integrity of the alleged victims
280. The representatives requested the Court, based on the statements rendered by the
alleged victims and the expert opinion of the clinical psychologist, Magdalena López de
Ibáñez, to declare that the State violated the right to humane treatment, "in its psychic
dimension", to the detriment of the alleged victims they represent, as a consequence of the
above mentioned declarations made by high-ranking officials, as well as of "the practice and
recurring commission, during […] the years 2001 to 2005, of a [set of] facts of physical
violence, threats to life and to humane treatment”, which would have caused a series of
physical and mental disturbances to all the equipment of Globovisión and, specially, to the
alleged victims.
281.
The Commission did not submit allegations in this regard.
282. The State pointed out that the alleged violation of the mental integrity was not
included in the application and that the alleged victims intend to create evidence in their
favor, inasmuch as the declarations made by the officials cannot be considered evidence in
order to prove such violation. It also expressed, regarding the expert opinion of Mrs. López
de Ibáñez, that “it is unspecified, makes general conclusions and when it refers to each one
of the people evaluated, it does not make a diagnosis". Likewise, the State considered that
it was a defective expert’s opinion, given the fact that she did not evaluate the alleged
victims from the medical’s point of view, she did not ordered additional studies and she
used a limited methodology. The State intends, in this way, to disqualify the expert
opinion’s conclusion regarding the fact that the syntomatology presented by the victims who
were examined, was directly associated with situations of physical attack and harassment;
therefore, it requested the Court to disregard the expert’s opinion in the assessment of the
facts of the case at hand.
283. The Court notes that the representatives sustained its argument, inter alia, in the
statements of the alleged victims, who made reference to the abridgement of their integrity
as the result of several situations in which they were involved, without specifying some
incident in particular. In particular, they mentioned that immediately after the attacks
during the exercise of their profession, they suffered from "states of anguish, fear and
depression", "stress", heart diseases, "panic attacks", “insomnia”, “chronical gastritis”,
“claustrophobia” and “digestive problems”, among other ailments. Nevertheless, this
Tribunal has long held that the statements made by the alleged victims and other people
with a direct interest in the case are useful as long as they provide more information on the
alleged violations and their consequences, though they cannot be assessed in isolation
(supra para. 103).
284. In addition to such statements, the only item of evidence furnished regarding this
issue is the already mentioned expert’s opinion of Mrs. Magdalena López de Ibáñez, expert
witness proposed by the representatives. This expert’s opinion consists in the psychological
evaluation of 38 alleged victims, by means of the conduction of individual interviews, tests
and questionnaires with each one of them276.
276
Cf. affidavit rendered by Magdalena López de Ibañez on April 8, 2008 (records of evidence, volume
XXXIII, pages 8551-8567).
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