84
Peruvian security forces was evidence of a resistance to the transfer operative[, …]
situation [that] authorized the gradual use of force.” These last statements were not
presented by the Commission in its brief of final arguments, but when it referred to
the ‘extra judicial killing of unarmed inmates,” the Commission stated in said
arguments that “in cases like those of the Criminal Center Castro Castro […] it is
proven that the use of fire weapons is not necessary and that[,] in any case, the
motivation announced for the operation is not the real one.”
214. The common intervener stated that there was no rebellious movement to
justify the use of force by the State, and that “[n]one of the evidence presented
during the proceedings before the Commission proved that in effect ‘Operative
Transfer 1’ Operative was a legal operative with the objective of transferring
prisoners.” Likewise, the intervener indicated that “[t]he Commission […] assents to
the version of the facts presented in a report issued by a Peruvian State body (the
CVR),” and that said report “contradicts all that presented before the Commission
itself (evidence never objected by the Peruvian state) y even more important, that in
its fundamental aspects contradicts the conclusions of the Peruvian judicial body
(National Terrorism Court) that investigated the facts regarding that occurred in
Castro Castro issued a judgment in the first months of 2004.” Besides, the
intervener made emphasis on the fact that “[i]f the objective had been a ‘necessary’
transfer of female prisoners to another prison ‘because said criminal center did not
have any more capacity’, why did they keep taking prisoners precisely to said center
up to the last week?”
215. It has not been proven before this Court that there was a riot when the first
act of the “operative” was carried out, or any other situation that would require the
legitimate use of force by State agents. On the contrary, the behavior observed by
the security agents, high State authorities, and other State officials during the four
days that the “operative” lasted, as well as after it, prove that it was an attack
carried out to threaten the life and integrity of the inmates that were located in
pavilions 1A and 4B of the Miguel Castro Castro Prison.
216. To reach the conclusion that there was no justifying cause for the legitimate
use of force by state agents and that it was an attack carried out to threaten the life
and integrity of the inmates located in pavilions 1A and 4B, the Court has taken into
consideration, among others, the following actions and omissions in which the state
authorities incurred at the time of the facts:
•
•
•
•
the state authorities did not notify that they would carry out a transfer
of the inmates on May 6, 1992 (supra para. 197(15));
the first act of the “operative” was extremely violent and there is no
evidence that the state agents recurred to the measures that must be
necessarily adopted prior to using force; that is, the first and only
resource was the attack against the female inmates;
as of the first act explosives were used to knock down the external
wall of pavilion 1A (supra para. 197(20);
as of the first day of the “operative” and during the three following
days weapons that the experts have classified as for war or
characteristic of a “military incursion” were used (supra paras. 186 and
187), such as instalazza type grenades, bombs, rockets, artillery
helicopters, mortars, and tanks, similarly tear gas, vomiting, and
paralyzing bombs were used against the inmates. The expert
Peerwani, who is a forensic expert (supra para. 187), pointed out that