15 The State was negligent in investigating the death of Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho, conducting no conscientious, effective investigation of the facts. Procedural deficiencies include the fact that several civil police officers who may have been involved in the murder of Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho, because of his intense legal work to defend human rights, were not investigated with due diligence. B) TESTIMONIAL EVIDENCE 57. On February 8, 2006, the Court received statements in public hearing from the witnesses proffered by the Inter-American Commission and the State (supra para. 23). This section contains the Court's summary of relevant portions of these witness statements. 1. Witnesses brought by the Commission a) Fernando Batista de Vasconcelos, who at the time of the murder of Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho served as Judicial Prosecutor in the District of Macaíba. He is now Prosecutor for the Protection of Public Property in the city of Natal In the year 1993, Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho signed a complaint charging an alleged death squad active in the State of Rio Grande do Norte for having committed approximately 30 homicides. The General Judicial Prosecutor therefore set up a Special Commission of Prosecuting Attorneys to investigate the homicides. As a consequence of his work on the Special Commission, the witness developed a close relationship with Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho. When he learned that the attorney had died, he went to Macaíba, where he took part in the very early stages of the investigation. Several days after the murder, however, he asked the General Judicial Prosecutor to remove him from the case because he feared for his safety. Members of the Special Commission had received threats, and he was one of the prosecutors who had signed complaints against the alleged death squad. Moreover, he understood that the murder had involved people associated with the police and, possibly, political groups in the city of Macaíba. The Special Commission of Prosecuting Attorneys succeeded in unmasking and prosecuting several people for crimes involving this group, including Jorge Luiz Fernandes, known as “Jorge Abafador,” who was convicted in two trials and given a combined sentence of approximately 60 years. Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho had participated in the elections in Macaíba, which also could have been related to his death, as the murder took place 15 to 20 days after municipal elections. Investigators considered other possible motives for his death as well, including drug trafficking and animals smuggling, but these were not incorporated into the process as concrete facts. In 1998, when the witness was working in the Office of the Human Rights Ombudsman in Natal, he was sought out by Antônio Lopes, known as Carla, who told him that he had conducted his own investigation into the death of Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho, and gave him a set of cassettes containing statements taken from several people. The witness delivered these cassettes to the Prosecutor of Macaíba, Henrique César Cavalcanti, who requested that the case be reopened in view of the new information. Antônio Lopes was subsequently murdered, and the witness believes his death stemmed from his attempt to clear up the murder of Gilson Nogueira de Carvalho.