9 A.3. Changes to the legal order as regards the death penalty in Guatemala 30. On February 11, 2016, the Constitutional Court of Guatemala declared unconstitutional the second paragraph of Article 132 of the Criminal Code, concerning the dangerousness of the perpetrator as a criterion for applying the death penalty, and it declared that this ruling has “general” effects.23 31. In the Court’s judgment of June 20, 2005, on Merits, Reparations, and Costs in the case of Fermín Ramírez v. Guatemala, this Court held that “the introduction in the criminal text of the dangerousness of the agent as a criterion for the criminal classification of the acts and the application of certain sanctions is not compatible with the freedom from ex post facto law and, therefore, contrary to the Convention.” Accordingly, it concluded that the State violated “Article 9 of the Convention, in relation to Article 2 of the same, for having maintained in force the part of Article 132 of the Criminal Code that refers to the dangerousness of the agent, once the Convention was ratified by Guatemala.”24 32. Subsequently, in the order of the Inter-American Court of February 6, 2019, on monitoring compliance with judgment in the case of Fermín Ramírez v. Guatemala, the Court, referring to the judgment of the Constitutional Court of February 11, 2016, indicated that: It would appear that the said judgment of the Constitutional Court declared the unconstitutionality of the only phrase of article 132 of the Criminal Code that established the possibility of applying the death penalty. It is not clear from the said judgment whether any possibility of applying the death penalty for the crime of murder in Guatemala has been eliminated, or whether it merely eliminated the possibility of applying it based on the dangerousness of the agent. However, based on the representatives’ assertion that a new legislative bill exists that would again apply the death penalty eliminating the phrase concerning the type of crime […], it would appear that it did eliminate the possibility of applying the death penalty for that crime from the country’s laws. In this regard, in the hypothesis that, according to the laws of Guatemala, it is understood that the death penalty has been annulled for the crime of murder, the Court finds it necessary to recall that Article 4 of the American Convention reflects a “progressive and irreversible http://ww2.oj.gob.gt/es/QueEsOJ/EstructuraOJ/UnidadesAdministrativas/CentroAnalisisDocumentacionJudicial/pdfs/Codigo s/CodigoProcesalPenal_CENADOJ.pdf Cf. Judgment of the Constitutional Court of Guatemala on February 11, 2016, File 1097-2015 (ESAP evidence file, 23 annex 22, folios. 1463 to 1478). The ruling stated the following: [T]his Court holds that the term dangerousness in the contested phrase, used as a decisive factor for sentencing, infringes the freedom from ex post facto laws, as only acts classified as crimes or failures and punishable by law prior to being committed can be punished. Because dangerousness is an endogenous characteristic whose inherently prospective nature precludes the precise determination of the legally protected interest that could be harmed, the punishment imposed would be linked to hypothetical conduct [...]. Even more serious would be psychobiological circumstances playing a role in the imposition of a punishment of the magnitude of the death penalty, which would constitute a severe reversal of the process of humanizing the repressive system of the past, whose rigid retributive theories considered capital punishment the final solution to the problem of delinquency [...]. The Constitutional Court [...] declares: I. Admissible the action brought for general partial unconstitutionality [...] of the second-to-last paragraph of Article 132 of the Criminal Code. The portion that reads “but the death penalty shall be imposed instead of the maximum prison sentence if the perpetrator is deemed especially dangerous due to the circumstances of the act or the setting, the manner of carrying it out, or the underlying motives. Those who do not receive the death penalty for this crime cannot be granted a reduced sentence for any reason” is declared unconstitutional. II. Accordingly, it will cease to have effect beginning the day after the publication of this judgment in the Diario de Centro América. 24 Case of Fermín Ramírez v. Guatemala. Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of June 20, 2005. Series C No. 126, paras. 96 and 98. With respect to the dangerousness of the perpetrator, see also Case of Raxcacó Reyes v. Guatemala. Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of September 15, 2005. Series C No. 133, para. 77, and Case of Fermín Ramírez v. Guatemala. Monitoring Compliance with Judgment. Resolution of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights of February 6, 2019, considering paragraph 6.