42. As to the requirement in the Convention that domestic remedies be exhausted, the petitioners allege that a criminal appeal was lodged against judgment No. 680-2007 on September 28, 2007. This petition was denied by the Third Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice, in a judgment of March 11, 2008. They contend that the appeals procedure is the only, and final, procedure permitted by Costa Rica’s legal system to contest a guilty verdict.Additionally, with regard to the petitions filed against preventive detention, they allege that three habeas corpus petitions were filed: on June 7, 2006, on August 28, 2007 48 and on January 24, 200849; and that they were decided on June 23, 2006, September 7, 2007 and February 1, 2008 respectively, without addressing the alleged victim’s defense claims. They indicate that under the Code of Criminal Procedure, there is no provision for an ordinary case of appeal from a decision of preventive imprisonment handed down by a trial court, and hence the only legal recourse permissible against such a decision is to file for a writ of habeas corpus. Petition P-1111-06: Guillermo Rodríguez Silva and Martín Rojas Hernández 43. The information available indicates that judgment No. 248-2004 of the Criminal Trial Court of Desamparados convicted Guillermo Rodríguez Silva of two crimes of aggravated rape and one crime of sexual abuse of a minor female, one crime of aggravated rape of another girl, all of which were concurrent criminal offenses, and as an accomplice in two crimes of aggravated rape of the same girls, for which he was sentenced to 42 years in prison. In the same judgment, Martín Rojas Hernández was convicted of two crimes of aggravated rape of the same girls, and was sentenced to a total of twenty-eight years in prison. They allege the international responsibility of the State of Costa Rica for alleged violation of the rights enshrined in Articles 4, 7, 8 and 9 of the American Convention. 44. They allege a number of violations of due process in the handling of the criminal case that ended with their conviction50.As to the requirement in the Convention that domestic remedies be exhausted, they indicate the following with regard to the State’s allegation that a request for review was not filed subsequent to the coming into force of Law 8.503: 1) that the law only allows a request for review in respect of procedural irregularities not claimed at appeal, which would not apply in their case51; 2) that they are illiterate and do not have the resources to engage an attorney to file a request for review, and the public defender rejected their request to file a review petition. They allege, therefore, that exhaustion of domestic remedies may not be required in their case. 45. As to the filing of a claim of unconstitutionality, the petitioners allege that under domestic law, filing such an action requires that there be a case pending before the courts, which they state was not so in their case, since the conviction was final and unappealable. They also say that it is required that they be represented by legal counsel, and that they do not have access to one.As to the filing of a petition for habeas corpus, they allege that if the public defender did not file for a writ of habeas corpus during the trial, they could not demand one, and that that was a failing of the public defender’s office. They maintain that such a petition is not in order after a conviction has been handed down. Regarding the request for a writ of amparo, they 48 This petition was filed subsequent to the judgment in the first instance. It was alleged that, according to the text of the operative part of the judgment, preventive detention of the alleged victim was extended on the assumption that he was detained without an order of preventive detention from July 17 to August 17, 2007. 49 They indicate that it was claimed in the petition that the alleged victim had been detained for seven days without the justification of a preventive detention order. 50 The petitioners allege that the formal reading of the facts in Costa Rica is surprising. They also mention poor prison conditions, an alleged violation of the guarantee of the rule of law in a number of rules in the Criminal Code, and lack of protection in the penitentiary. They state that they made all their complaints in the appeals proceedings, and could therefore not present them again in the review process.They specify that they were informed of this concept by the public defender as grounds for not proceeding on their request to file for review. They also allege that the appeals proceedings to which they had access was decided prior to approval of law No 8.503 and that it was therefore decidedin a formalistic and limited way, without allowing for a review of the facts of the judgment. 51 10