On February 28, 2013, the petitioners requested a three-month extension of the time period given for submitting their additional observations on the merits of the petition. In accordance with Article 37.2 of its Rules of Procedure, the Commission granted the petitioners an extension, set to expire on March 29, 2013. On March 27, 2013 and again on December 2, 2013, the petitioners requested other extensions of two and three months, respectively, for submitting their additional observations on the merits of their petition, a request not granted pursuant to Article 37.2 of the IACHR’s Rules of Procedure. 7. The petitioners submitted their additional observations on the merits of the petition on November 21, 2014. Then, on December 11, 2014, the petitioners filed the annexes to the present case. The Commission forwarded the pertinent parts of that brief to the State on January 13, 2015, and requested that it submit its observations within one month. On January 21, 2015, the State requested an extension of the time period provided in Article 37.1 of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure. The Commission acceded to the State’s request, extending the time period for submitting its observations until May 13, 2015. On May 11, 2015, the State sought a two-month extension, invoking Article 37.2 of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure. The Commission granted an extension, which was to expire on July 13, 2015. On July 13, 2015, the State requested an extension, which was denied under Article 37.2 of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure. 8. The State presented its observations on the merits of the petition on August 13, 2015. It also expressed its interest in entering into a friendly settlement process. That report was forwarded to the petitioners on August 20, 2015, who were asked to indicate, within one month, whether they would be interested in initiating a friendly settlement process. On September 25, 2015, the petitioners submitted a communication in which they informed the Commission that they were not interested in embarking upon said process with the State. On October 16, 2015 said communication was forwarded to the State. III. POSITION OF THE PARTIES A. Petitioners 9. According to the petitioners, the events in this case occurred within the context of the Brazilian dictatorship that began with the coup d’état staged on March 31, 1964, and lasted until 1985. They alleged in this regard that throughout this period, the State’s security forces engaged in the systematic and widespread practice of grave human rights violations committed against union leaders, political dissidents, journalists, students and others. The practice included arbitrary detentions, torture and extrajudicial executions. They also pointed out that the Brazilian media were subjected to censorship, as a way to ensure that they would not report news that might in any way tarnish the image of prosperity that the de facto regime wanted to propagate. 10. Against this backdrop, Vladimir Herzog, a 38-year-old journalist and director of journalism of the public television channel “TV Cultura”, was supposedly viewed by the military regime as an “enemy of the State” because of the news reports he had made public, particularly a 1974 “historical account” that examined the first decade of the military takeover in Brazil. According to the petitioners, on the night of October 24, 1975, agents of the Second Army’s Department of Information Operations of the Center for Internal Defense Operations (“DOI/CODI”) in São Paulo summoned Vladimir Herzog to give a statement at that institution’s headquarters, and tried to locate and arrest him, without success. Nevertheless, the petitioners report that Vladimir Herzog appeared of his own accord at DOI/CODI headquarters the following day, October 25, 1975, to offer a statement, whereupon he was arbitrarily detained, without any warrant from a competent judicial authority. 11. According to the petitioners, that same day the then-commander of the DOI/CODI publicly disclosed that Vladimir Herzog had died in his cell, supposedly by suicide. The petitioners contend that the journalist’s death was an extrajudicial execution carried out by torture, and that it was made to look like a suicide, in line with an established practice during Brazil’s military dictatorship. According to the petitioners, his death shocked Brazilian society and raised awareness about the widespread practice of torturing political prisoners. 2