53 proceeding conducted against Messrs. Cabrera and Montiel, the domestic courts assessed and examined both the medical certificates and the expert opinions undertaken in order to analyze the allegations of torture, the Court observes that said proceeding had a purpose other than to investigate the alleged perpetrators of these allegations since, at the same time, Messrs. Cabrera and Montiel were being tried. Therefore, the fact that no autonomous investigation against the alleged responsible was conducted before the ordinary courts prevented to dispelle of doubts and to clarify the allegations of torture. Based on the foregoing, it is clear to this Court that the State failed to comply with its duty to investigate ex officio the human rights violations committed against Messrs. Cabrera and Montiel. In the instant case, it was essential that the different domestic judicial courts ordered new measures to clarify the relationship between the signs found on the victims’ bodies and the facts they alleged to have suffered as torture. 132. Likewise, the Court considers that this obligation to investigate the alleged acts of torture was even more relevant if the context that preceded the instant case regarding the confessions and statement made under duress is considered as well as the duties of strict due diligence that must operate in areas of high military presence (supra paras. 86 to 89). In this respect, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture has pointed out that “generally speaking, not only judges but also lawyers, the Public Prosecutor's Office and the Judicial Police itself are overloaded with work, which may explain the tendency to rely on confessions as a way of clearing up cases rapidly.”197 Moreover, the United Nations Special Rapporteur sustained that “[…] in normal practice, there is broad discretion in the application of the law and therefore a great risk exists that investigations will be falsified, carried out using duress or recorded illegally, ignoring potentially key evidence or taking into account other less important evidence that might slant the investigation in such a way as to affect or benefit a particular person; evidence may even be made intentionally to "disappear.”198 197 United Nations. Economic and Social Council. Report of the Special Rapporteur on Torture, Sir Nigel Rodley. Visit to Mexico UN Doc (E/CNA/1998/38/Add.2), January 14, 1998, para. 43. 198 United Nations. Economic and Social Council. Report of the Special Rapporteur on Torture, supra note 197, para. 64.

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