9 Article 43 of the mentioned law “stated the non-recognition of any jurisdiction.” Thus, everybody should be processed by ordinary criminal judges. It also stated that bail could not be applied as a substituting measure of the confinement measures. It also prohibited that those convicted benefit from parole. It stated, as well, that the liberty of an indictee could not be executed if there was not a confirmation from the superior judge in the event of dismissals or acquittals. The criminal action in trials related to the Law for the Control of the Trafficking of Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances was regulated by the general dispositions of the Code of Criminal Procedures. However, in what referred to the determination of the condition of narcotics and psychotropic substances, Article 46 of the Law stated that “in all criminal investigations and cases followed to determine the infractions defined in the present Law, the expert report of the National Department for the Control of Narcotics is obligatory.” The purpose of this norm was that the mentioned Administration be the only institution authorized to determine the condition of the controlled substance. Also, the evidence of the infractions, due to their nature, was obligatory and irreplaceable, therefore in its absence the condition of the substance may not be determined by any other means. With regard to the presumption of innocence, the Constitution of 1979 recognized it as a fundamental right. It was guaranteed until there was a final judgment. However, with the enactment of Law N° 108 of Narcotic and Psychotropic Substances of September 16, 1990, this principle was contradicted and affected. The Constitution Court acknowledged this situation in its Order of December 16, 1997, where it was declared unconstitutional. Article 116 of the Law stated that the Police’s informative report was a “serious presumption of guilt, as long as the body of a crime was justified.” Therefore the indictee was imposed the duty of proving their innocence. However, while this norm was in force, it meant the violation of the presumption of innocence of many people prosecuted for crimes related to the trafficking and possession of narcotics and psychotropic substances. The Code of Criminal Procedures, published in the Official Newspaper No. 511 of June 10, 1983, divided the criminal process in four stages: the summary, the intermediate stage, the full trial or trial and the appeals stage. Each stage will have a term within which it must be developed. Therefore, the criminal process, without considering the appeals stage, must have an approximate duration of 126 days, that is, a little more than four months. However, in reality, no criminal process was decided in the established terms, and some even lasted several years. Pursuant to that established in the Code of Criminal Procedures the indictee or accused had to have a defense counsel appointed by the court, specifically, by the judge when the he or she ordered the investigation of an alleged crime; the mentioned defense counsel had the obligation to represent the accused as long as they did not appoint their own defense counsel. Also, “once the trial begun, the court had to assign a defense counsel to the indictee, and this defense counsel could not decline the exercise of said defense without just cause.” Without detriment to these norms, the defense counsel appointed by the court performed a very limited defense and many times this defense did not exceed the mere procedural formality without an adequate defense of the indictees.