32 That night they returned to the hotel and heard that the President of Guatemalan himself had ordered the exhumation to proceed. The following day, they tried to obtain an authorization from the Magistrate of Tecún Umán, but he “had gone into hiding”, for fear of collaborating with the procedure, so that his assistant had to intervene. On the same occasion, the prosecutor, Ramsés Cuestas, told them that they only had permission to excavate for one day when, according to their calculations, they needed a month to measure and prepare the site. Finally, it was impossible to conduct the exhumation requested, because the life of the prosecutor Arango was in danger, and he resigned from his position in September 1995. Subsequently, she again tried to have an exhumation conducted in Las Cabañas, this time with the new prosecutor, Shilvia Jerez, but, once again, this was not possible. The new prosecutor was assassinated in May 1998. The authorities stated that they would “continue to obstruct any exhumation procedure in Las Cabañas [...] until they receive[d] an amnesty through the peace talks.” While seeking justice in Guatemala, the witness and her supporters were threatened and attacked, and there was also a campaign to slander them. Among the groups that supported her and were threatened, were the Mutual Support Group and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. A bomb exploded in the building of the Polytechnic School, during her first hunger strike. A US Government agency told her that there were “clear messages [coming from the] network of contacts in Guatemala, which [affirmed that they had] heard [… ] senior members of the armed forces planning […] to pay someone” to assassinate her. In January, a bomb exploded in the car of her lawyer, José E. Pertierra, in Washington D.C. The witness, Otoniel de la Roca, was also harassed and threatened. She had debts of US$35,000.00 as a result of continuing with the case, but she had never thought of filing a civil suit for damages, because she was seeking justice and for the remains of Efraín Bámaca Velásquez to be returned to her. Should she receive compensation as a result of the proceeding before the Inter-American Court, she would like all of it to be given to the next of kin of Bámaca Velásquez. There was “a total obstruction” of the investigation of this case in Guatemala and no one has been found responsible. The criminal action that is being processed in Retalhuleu is still open. c. Testimony of Julio Arango Escobar, former special prosecutor for the Bámaca Velásquez Case, Guatemalan lawyer, Guatemalan Ombudsman. On May 7, 1995, he was appointed special prosecutor for the investigation of the Bámaca Velásquez Case. When the investigation started, the files were in the Office of the Military Judge of the Department of Retalhuleu and, under the military system of justice, a final stay of proceedings had been pronounced in favor of 12 members of the armed forces. He appealed this before the Retalhuleu Appeals Chamber and