that the powers of attorney granted by the presumed victims in order to be represented in
the proceedings before the Court meet the same formalities as those required by the
domestic law of the defendant State.” 64 In this context, the State’s arguments are not
sufficient to consider that these persons are inadequately represented. This conclusion is
supported by the fact that there has been continuity in the measures taken by the
representative organizations starting with the processing of the case before the
Commission. Indeed, all the representative organizations acted as petitioners during the
merits stage before the Commission, and there is no record that any of the presumed
victims indicated their inconformity throughout the years that the proceedings lasted. 65 In
addition, Nené Fils-Aimé and William Gelin are next of kin of persons who did grant power
of attorney; the former is the son of Jeanty Fils-Aimé and the latter of Bersson Gelin.
Therefore the Court rejects the said reservations and determines that they are not
sufficient to question their status as presumed victims.
A.2.4. Questions raised about identity
89. The State, during the public hearing and subsequently, questioned the identity of the
person identified as Willian Medina and presented information in this regard, as well as
that of Awilda, Luis Ney and Carolina Isabel, all surnamed Medina (supra para. 63).
Nevertheless, in its answering brief, the State had asserted that Willian Medina Ferreras,
Awilda Medina, Luis Ney Medina and Carolina Isabel Medina should be considered
presumed victims (supra para. 60) and that the first three “are Dominican citizens as
revealed by the corresponding entries in the Civil Registry,” and the Court will understand
this to be so. However, in the case of Willian Medina, the State based some of its
arguments on what happened during the public hearing following the presentation of a
video, and on the fact that it had opened administrative and judicial proceedings to cancel
Mr. Medina’s electoral identity document and the birth declarations of his children Awilda,
Luis Ney and Carolina Isabel (infra paras. 128, 207 and 208).
90. Similarly, in a document forwarded to the Court for the first time during the
processing of the provisional measures, and also presented by the Commission in annex
to the Merits report, the State asserted that it had reached the “conclusion” of “identity
theft in the case of Rafaelito Pérez Charles.”
91. This Court emphasizes that there is no record that the above-mentioned
proceedings, or others, have concluded, or that the competent authority has reached a
final decision establishing that the identity of these persons is different from the one that
appears in the documents issued by the State. Consequently, the Court does not have any
evidence that warrants disagreeing with the information indicated in the State’s
documentation. Thus, the Court rejects the State’s arguments and, for the effects of this
Judgment, will consider the persons identified as Willian Medina Ferreras, Awilda Medina,
Luis Ney Medina, Carolina Isabel Medina and Rafaelito Pérez Charles as presumed victims,
with those names.
A.2.5. Persons who will not be considered presumed victims
64
Case of Velásquez Rodríguez v. Honduras. Preliminary objections, para. 33; Case of Loayza Tamayo v.
Peru. Reparations and costs. Judgment of November 27, 1998. Series C No. 42, para. 98, and Case of Vélez Loor
v. Panama. Preliminary objections, merits, reparations and costs. Judgment of November 23, 2010. Series C No.
218, para. 54.
65
As explained in the Merits report, CEJIL also acted as petitioner at the admissibility stage, together with
entities who did not act at the merits stage: “the International Human Rights Law Clinic at the University of
California, Berkeley, School of Law, Boalt Hall, […] and the National Coalition for Haitian Rights (NCHR).”
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