6 Court rejected the State's proposal of oral evidence. (2) 21. On March 18, 1997, the President summoned the parties to a public hearing to be held at the seat of the Court on April 19 of that year in order to hear the statements of the witnesses and the expert report furnished by the Inter-American Commission. Likewise, the President instructed the Secretariat to inform the parties that they could, immediately after that evidence was received, present final oral arguments on the merits of the case. 22. On April 19, 1997, the Court heard the statements of the witnesses and the expert witness proposed by the Inter-American Commission. There appeared before the Court, for the Republic of Ecuador: Laura Donoso-de León, agent; and Manuel Badillo-G., alternate agent; for the Inter-American Commission: David J. Padilla, Assistant Executive Secretary; Elizabeth Abi-Mershed, attorney; Alejandro Ponce, assistant; and Richard Wilson, assistant; as witnesses proposed by the Inter-American Commission: Margarita Ramadán de Suárez; Carlos Ramadán; Carmen Aguirre; and Rafael Iván Suárez-Rosero; and as expert witness proposed by the Inter-American Commission: Ernesto Albán-Gómez. 23. The following is the Court's summary of the statements of the witnesses and the expert's report. a. Testimony of Carlos Alberto Ramadán-Urbano, brother-in-law of Rafael Iván Suárez-Rosero On the night of June 23, 1992, he was informed by telephone that Mr. SuárezRosero had been arrested by the police and was being detained at the Interpol offices in Quito. He did not know whether Mr. Suárez-Rosero had had any previous problems with the police. He was unable to see him personally until July 28, 1992, but took him clothes and food and exchanged brief notes with him through "pasadores". As of July 28, 1992, when he was able to see him for the first time, he (2) The organization Rights International, the Center for International Human Rights Law, Inc. dispatched to the Court a communication as an amicus curiae on June 14, 1997, and Mr. Raúl Moscoso-Álvarez submitted another to the Court on September 11, 1997.