11 . of admissibility of a request before the Inter-American System, the presuppositions of this rule must be verified, as argued even though the analysis of the formal presuppositions prevails over those of a material nature and, in certain occasions, the latter may be related to the merits of the matter.27 38. In the present case, as can be concluded from the dossier from the processing of the petition before the Commission, on September 26, 2002 the Commission forwarded Petition 4109/02 to the State and granted it two months to respond. On October 8, 2003, approximately a year after the forwarding of the original petition and during the admissibility phase of the proceedings, the State sent its response, in which it argued the lack of exhaustion of domestic remedies. The State indicated that the Public Prosecutors’ Office was working actively on the 22 criminal cases presented by the petitioners before the prosecutors’ offices; that the petitioners had at their disposal extraordinary legal actions, such as constitutional protection, to assert their rights, and that the time invested in the elucidation of the violations denounced was reasonable based on the complexity of the cases and the evidentiary dynamics. Later, on October 15, 2003, the Commission asked the State to inform the first, in a specific and detailed manner, of the actions carried out by the Public Prosecutors’ Office with regard to the criminal accusations in process and asked it to clearly indicate the domestic remedies that could be exercised by the petitioners and their effectiveness. There is no evidence that the State responded to this requirement. On February 27, 2004 the admissibility report was issued. 28 39. The Court observes, on one hand, that the State presented its first response to the petition outside of the term granted by the Commission for those effects. Upon declaring the admissibility of the petition, the Commission considered that there was an unjustified delay in the investigations and that the application of the exception stipulated in subparagraph c of Article 46(2) of the American Convention could be applied. 40. On the other hand, the Court considers that a preliminary analysis on the effectiveness of the investigation of the facts of the present case would imply an evaluation of the State’s actions in relation to its obligations to guarantee the rights acknowledged in the American Convention whose violation is being argued, specifically through serious and effective investigations, which must be analyzed within the merits of the case. Therefore, this Tribunal considers it appropriate to add the objection presented by the State to the merits of the case and examine the parties’ arguments upon deciding if the State is responsible for the violation of Articles of the Convention that are argued as being violated in this case. Specifically, when certain exceptions to the rule of non-exhaustion of domestic remedies are invoked, such as the ineffectiveness of those remedies or the non-existence of the due process of law, it is not only being argued that the aggrieved party is not compelled to file those remedies, but the State involved is also being accused of a new violation to the obligations assumed in the Convention. Under these circumstances, the issue of domestic remedies is extremely related to the merits of the case. (Cf. Case of Velásquez Rodríguez, supra note 26, para. 91; Case of Fairén Garbi and Solís Corrales V. Honduras. Preliminary Objections. Judgment of June 26, 1987. Series C No. 2, para. 90; and Case of Godínez Cruz V. Honduras. Preliminary Objections. Judgment of June 26, 1987. Series C No. 3, para. 93). Therefore, on several occasions the Court has analyzed the arguments regarding that preliminary objection along with the other merits of the case (Cf. Case of Velásquez Rodríguez V. Honduras, supra 26, para. 96; Case of Heliodoro Portugal V. Panama. .Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of August 12, 2008. Series C. No. 186, para. 19; and Case of Castañeda Gutman V. Mexico. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of August 6, 2008. Series C No. 184, para. 34) (Cf. Case of Velásquez Rodríguez, supra note 26, para. 96; Case of Castillo Petruzzi et al. V. Peru. Preliminary Objections. Judgment of September 4, 1998. Series C. No. 41, para. 53; and Case of Salvador Chiriboga, Preliminary Objection and Merits. Judgment of May 6, 2008. Series C No. 179, para. 45). 27 28 Cf. Admissibility Report No. 6/04 (dossier of appendixes to the application, appendix 2, folios 83-103).