August 22, 2014 Re: Case No. 12,700 Agustín Bladimiro Zegarra Marín Peru Mr. Secretary: On behalf of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, I have the honor to submit to the jurisdiction of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights case 12,700 - Agustín Bladimiro Zegarra Marín v. the Republic of Peru (hereinafter “the State”, “the Peruvian State” or “Peru”). The case concerns violation of the principle of presumption of innocence and of the court’s obligation to provide a reasoned judgment, to the detriment of Agustín Bladimiro Zegarra Marín, who on November 8, 1996 was convicted by the Superior Court’s Fifth Criminal Chamber of crimes against the administration of justice (personal complicity), crimes against the public faith (falsification of documents in general) and corruption of government officials. That court authority specifically wrote that the only evidence against the victim were the statements made by his co-defendants. Furthermore, although there was exculpatory evidence that directly refuted those statements, the court did not explain the reasons why that evidence did not create doubt as to the victim’s criminal culpability and instead simply stated that the charges made by the co-defendant were “feasible”. The Commission concluded that the criminal conviction of an individual based solely on the “feasibility” of the assertions made in a co-defendant’s statement must be examined in light of the principle of presumption of innocence. Furthermore, in the instant case, the Commission found that the burden of proof had been turned upside down, which was patently evident in the conviction, where the Fifth Criminal Court wrote that “no convincing rebuttal evidence has been presented that would show the defendant to be completely innocent of the crimes of which he stands accused.” Furthermore, the Commission found that the December 17, 1997 decision on the victim’s appeal to vacate the court ruling did not respect the right to appeal a judgment and that neither the appeal to vacate the decision nor the appeal for review, decided on August 24, 1999, constituted effective remedies against the violations of due process committed with the conviction handed down by the court of first instance. Mr. Pablo Saavedra Alessandri, Secretary Inter-American Court of Human Rights Apartado 6906-1000 San José, Costa Rica Enclosures