16
64
detainee’s admission; they merely drew up a “certificate of release,” which contains no signature of any
military or judicial authority or of any other person who could certify the veracity of his release.
65.
The IACHR notes that the circumstances surrounding the arrest and transfer of Jeremías
Osorio Rivera and the way in which information on his whereabouts was released are consistent with the
modus operandi for forced disappearances used by the security forces during the internal armed conflict
in Peru. As explained in section C.1 of this report, those practices were used systematically, between
1989 and 1993 in particular, against people suspected of belonging to or collaborating with insurgent
groups. The soldiers who arrested Jeremías Osorio not only suspected him of belonging to Shining Path,
they also accused him of having participated in murder, of carrying a police-issue firearm, and of
possessing and detonating explosives during a celebration in the Nunumia community center on April 28,
1991.
66.
The sequence of irregularities described in paragraphs 63 and 64 supra, the way in which
the victim was transferred to the Cajatambo Countersubversive Base on April 30, 1991, the constant
refusals to provide information on his situation in spite of his family’s appeals, and the general context
surrounding those incidents are sufficient for the IACHR to reasonably conclude that Jeremías Osorio
Rivera disappeared while in the custody of members of the Peruvian Army who were acting under the
orders of Lt. Juan Carlos César Tello Delgado.
67.
In light of all the above, the IACHR considers it has been proven that members of an
Army patrol from the Cajatambo Countersubversive Base detained Jeremías Osorio Rivera on April 28,
1991, and proceeded to make him disappear between April 30 and May 1 of that year. In addition, the
Commission concludes it has been proven that those members of the military concealed the information
on the victim’s real whereabouts and then released false information, in an attempt to evade
responsibility. Finally, the IACHR believes it has been proven that by forcing him to travel for several
hours on April 30, 1991, with his hands tied and his head covered by a hood, and with grounded fears for
his life, Jeremías Osorio Rivera was the victim of intense physical and mental suffering, deliberately
inflicted on him by personnel of the Cajatambo Countersubversive Base.
2.
Judicial proceedings in connection with the disappearance of Jeremías Osorio
Rivera
68.
This section sets out the different actions pursued by the various agencies of the civilian
and military justice systems since Jeremías Osorio Rivera’s disappearance. The IACHR notes that it does
not have complete copies of the corresponding legal case files, in spite of having asked the Peruvian
65
State and the petitioners to provide them on July 29, 2011. With the exception of the prosecutorial
accusation of October 30, 2007, and the judgments handed down by the National Criminal Chamber on
December 17, 2008, and by the Supreme Court of Justice on June 24, 2010, copies of which were
provided by both parties, the documents referred to in this section came exclusively from the petitioners
as enclosures with their communication of November 25, 2010, which was received by the IACHR on
December 8 of that year.
(a)
The criminal proceedings before the Provincial Prosecutor and Provincial Court of
Cajatambo between May 1991 and July 1992 (case file No. 24-91)
69.
According to the statements made by Porfirio Osorio Rivera, on May 3, 1991, he went to
the office of the Provincial Prosecutor of Cajatambo to file a complaint against Lt. Juan Carlos Tello, who
64
Annex 25: Judgment of December 17, 2008, issued by the National Criminal Chamber in the criminal prosecution of
Juan Carlos César Tello Delgado, case file No. 554-07, section 2, “Statement of the Accused,” in which Juan Carlos Tello states
that “upon arriving in Cajatambo he housed the victim in a room on the base; he did not record his admission because that is a
police procedure and he was not used to carrying out arrests or interventions…”
65
Annex 36: (a) Note of July 29, 2011, from the IACHR to the Peruvian State; (b) Note of July 29, 2011, from the IACHR
to the petitioners.