37
The events started in the dawn of May 6, 1992 when explosions were heard in
pavilion 1A, where the women were located. The inmates moved to said pavilion
through the conduits to help the women. When they arrived they smelled
gunpowder, they could feel a burning sensation in their throat and they could not
breath. There were dead and injured people. As a consequence of the shots fired by
the soldiers from the roof toward pavilion 1A Marcos Calloccunto died and Víctor
Javier Olivos Peña was seriously injured. The witness was injured by a bomb,
situation that was complicated by the tuberculosis that he already suffered. Jesús
Villaverde was also injured during these events.
During the attacks the inmates did not receive food, water, or medical attention.
Some of the injured died because of the lack of attention. The State agents killed
people selectively, such as Janet Talavera. After undergoing four days of attacks, the
survivors were transferred to an area called “no man’s land”. They were forced to be
naked and outdoors, face down on the floor, and they could not use the bathroom.
Besides this, they were beaten and stepped on. The witness did not receive medical
attention and remained with the same clothes for fifteen days.
The tortures continued during the following months. As punishment they were forced
to sing Peru’s national anthem, whose first verse says “we are free”, kerosene
camphor, and rat skin were thrown into the food. They were kept locked inside 23
hours and a half per day, visits were restricted, working, singing, exercising, and
developing any type of activity within the criminal center was forbidden.
As a consequence of what happened in the criminal center, his emotional
relationships were affected and his health worsened. The tuberculosis he already
suffered from got worse, he lost his teeth, and his vision in great proportion, and he
contracted allergies to humidity and developed digestive problems. His family also
suffered as a consequence of the facts. His parents suffered health problems and the
economic resources that were going to be for his siblings were used on him, reason
for which his siblings have not been able to conclude their academic studies.
b)
Called upon by the
adjudication of the case:
10.
President
as
evidence
to
facilitate
Nieves Miriam Rodríguez Peralta, alleged victim
On the “days prior to May 6 there was an ‘inspection’ in which it was verified that
there was no type of weapons [or] ‘Armed resistance’ to justify the crime of genocide
pursuant to the Peruvian legislation against the group of prisoners of pavilions 1A
and 4B accused of belonging to Peru’s Communist Party.”
On May 6, 1992 she was sleeping when she heard the first explosion in the women’s
pavilion and she soon realized that they were being “brutally and cowardly” attacked.
She could notice that they had blown open one of the walls of pavilion 1A and the
yard with dynamite and that “there were bullets, bombs, and tear gases
everywhere.” Likewise, she observed that police officers were proceeding to place
dynamite on the roof of the fourth floor. The inmates tried to find an exit through a
conduit because “[i]t seemed that they were going to throw the pavilion down.” The
conduits were not tunnels built by the inmates, but instead constructions that joined
the pavilions. It was difficult to enter the conduit because you had to pass in front of
a window and the snipers would shoot at the smallest movement. The inmate María