but merely took exception to the Commission’s views. This argument can thus be dismissed
as groundless.
43.
The Court will also address the possibility that the Commission prejudged the
effectiveness of investigations undertaken in the ordinary courts and recalls that the points set
forth in the Admissibility Report constitute a prima facie legal discussion serving merely as a
preliminary analysis. The Court would like to note, in this regard, that the Commission must
necessarily conduct just such a preliminary analysis to determine whether or not the objections
of failure to exhaust domestic remedies are admissible. To construe this in any other way
would suggest that during the admissibility stage, the Commission cannot give an opinion on
the reasons for holding a petition admissible and would strip the provisions of Convention
Article 46(2) of any useful effect, because if any of its conditions is present, the Commission
must conduct a preliminary analysis in order to justify its decision.
44.
The Court, having considered the State’s arguments, therefore holds that the claims of
serious error, violating the right to defense of the parties, is groundless. Therefore, the instant
case presents no postulates that the Court should review the proceeding before the
Commission. The Court denies the preliminary objection brought by the State.
B.
Second preliminary objection: “Objection for failure to exhaust
domestic remedies”
Arguments by the State, the Commission, and the representatives
45.
The State noted that it had lodged this preliminary objection at the proper time during
the admissibility stage of the proceedings before the Inter-American Commission. It pointed
out that the Commission “ignored the State’s arguments [on the complexity of the case and
the need to process a large volume of evidence], issuing a Report on the Merits that brought
the case before the Court; this had triggered an inconsistency because a process was taking
place before the inter-American system with a ruling on the merits by the […] Commission,
even as the criminal proceeding continued to unfold in the domestic jurisdiction, the natural
sphere for deciding whether the alleged extrajudicial executions had been committed.” It
added that the Court, in its analysis of this objection, should consider the situation that existed
at the time the Commission gave its ruling on the admissibility of the petition, that is, February
27, 2004; according to the State, any legal irregularity committed by the Commission in its
Admissibility Report should be examined in light of the circumstances prevailing at the
moment, when the amount of time was not being challenged as unjustified, or at least, when
sufficient grounds for the alleged violation had not been found. It added that the domestic
courts had been pursuing another criminal trial at the time against Alberto Fujimori Fujimori
for the murder of Cruz Sánchez, Meléndez Cueva and Peceros Pedraza; and against Manuel
Tullume Gonzáles as the alleged accomplice in the same crime against Cruz Sánchez, and the
process had not yet been completed.
46.
The Commission noted that while the State had reported in due time about the conflict
of jurisdiction between the military courts and the ordinary courts, and submitted information
on both processes, it had brought no arguments about whether or not the military criminal
proceeding was appropriate for investigating the facts of the case; moreover, its brief implied
only the existence of “a pending criminal trial,” which because it was not described as military,
should be understood as pertaining to the ordinary courts. The Commission also emphasized
that during the admissibility stage, the State had brought no specific arguments about the
military criminal process, which at that time was still underway. It was in the Commission’s
stage on the merits and, subsequently, in the process before the Court, that the State had
brought up the alleged complexity of the case, which was not a preliminary argument, but part