31 permanent, continues to be executed. In these cases it can be said that the crime ‘had a continuous execution.’ […] [t]hus, pursuant with that established in Article 285 A of Legislative Decree 959, the facts proven in the records, fit into Article three hundred and twenty of the Criminal Code in force, this is crimes against Humanity- Forced Disappearance.” Cfr. National Criminal Chamber of Peru, judgment of March 20, 2006, Exp:111-04, D.D Cayo Rivera Schreiber. In this same sense, the Constitutional Court of Peru, upon analyzing the legality of a habeas corpus presented in favor of Mr. Genaro Villegas Namuche –who disappeared in the year 1992-, determined that “[…] in permanent crimes, new criminal regulations may arise and they will be applicable to those who commit the crime at that time, without that meaning a retroactive application of criminal law. Such is the case of the crime of forced disappearance, which, according to Article III of the Inter-American Convention on Forced Disappearance of Persons, shall be considered a permanent crime as long as the fate or whereabouts of the victim are not determined.” Cfr. Constitutional Court of Peru, judgment of March 18, 2004, dossier No. 2488-2002-HC/TC, para. 26 (At: http://www.tc.gob.pe/jurisprudencia/2004/024882002-HC.html). This precedent was later ratified by the same Constitutional Court in the judgment of December 9, 2004 in which it denied a habeas corpus presented by one of the alleged perpetrators in the cases of “Barrios Altos” and “La Cantuta”. Thus, the Tribunal established that “the guarantee of the prior law derived from the rule of freedom from ex post facto laws is not violated if a criminal rule that was not in force prior to the start of the execution of the fact is applied to a permanent crime if it results applicable because the same is still being carried out. In this sense, the fact that the criminal definition of forced disappearance of persons was not always in force, is not an impairment to carry out the corresponding criminal proceedings for said crime and to punish those responsible. Cfr. Constitutional Court of Peru, judgment of December 9, 2004, dossier No. 2798-04, para. 22 (At: http://www.tc.gob.pe/jurisprudencia/2005/02798-2004-HC.html ). Similarly, the Supreme Court of Justice of Mexico examined this problem when it analyzed the entry into force of the Inter-American Convention on Forced Disappearance of People adopted at Belém do Pará and established that “[t]he stipulations established in the Convention may not be applied to those behaviors that constitute a disappearance that has terminated before the new regulation has become obligatory, but it shall not be interpreted in the sense that it will not be applied to the criminal behavior of said offense that having started before its validity continues to be carried out, because since the crime of forced disappearance of persons has the nature of permanent or continuous it may occur that the criminal behavior continue occurring during the validity of the Convention.” Cfr. Supreme Court of Mexico. Thesis: P./J. 49/2004, Judicial Seminar of the Federation and its Gaceta, Ninth Period, In Full. Likewise, the Constitutional Court of Bolivia in its judgment of November 12, 2001, in which it analyzed an ruling in which it ordered the investigation into the forced disappearance of Juan Carlos Trujillo Oroza, it decided that “in permanent crimes, the statute of limitation should be compute as of the moment in which it is no longer being carried out. In this order, we must precise that crimes based on the duration of the offense to the juridical right attacked are classified into instant offenses and permanent offenses. In the instant crimes, the offense to the juridical right ceases immediately after the criminal behavior has been carried out (Ex. The crime of murder); instead, in the permanent crimes, the consummative activity does not cease upon the execution of the criminal action but instead it lasts in time, in a manner such that all moments of its duration are considered as consummation of the criminal action.” Cfr Constitutional Court of Bolivia judgment of November 12, 2001, No. 1190/01-R. (At: http://www.tribunalconstitucional.gov.bo/resolucion3350.html) In the same sense, the Supreme Court of Justice of Panama stated that “it cannot in this aspect [of forced disappearance], under any circumstance, bring about criminal principles such as the rule of freedom from ex post facto laws.” Cfr. Supreme Court of Justice of Panama, Criminal Chamber, judgment of March 2, 2004. On its part, the Supreme Court of Justice of Venezuela ruled that “if during the illegal deprivation of freedom of the passive subject the active subject continues to refuse to reveal the fate or whereabouts of the person deprived of their freedom or to acknowledge they are in that condition, and at the same time, the legal definition of the crime of forced disappearance of persons goes into effect, it must be concluded that the subjects implied in that behavior may be prosecuted and declared guilty and responsible for the crime of forced disappearance of persons, without this implying retroactivity of criminal law, since it refers to the application of the law that defines an unconcluded crime.” Cfr. Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, judgment of August 10, 2007. With regard to the continuous and permanent nature of forced disappearance, the Colombian Constitutional Court stated that “this offense shall be considered of continuous or permanent execution while the whereabouts of the victim are unknown. This obligation is reasonable if the fact that the lack of the missing person prevents the victim and their next of kin from exercising the judicial guarantees necessary for the protection of their rights and the clarification of the truth is taken into consideration: the person is still missing. This situation implies that the violation to the protected goods is prolonged in time and, therefore, the behavior is still criminally defined and illegal until there is knowledge of the whereabouts of the person, thus allowing the exercise of those judicial guarantees.” Cfr. Judgment C – 580/02 of July 31, 2002 of the Constitutional Court of Colombia.