85. On August 10, 2005, two lawyers of the Vicariate of Caracas´ legal department were granted a “Special Power, sufficiently broad” by Mrs. Moreno so that “they could act jointly or separately on [her] behalf and represent, defend and uphold [her] rights, actions and interests as a victim of the murder of her husband Joe Castillo.” On August 15, 2005 the 83rd Prosecutor’s Office “allowed access to the case file for a period of four hours” to Mrs. Moreno’s attorney, who retired stating that she would continue examining it the following day. 86. On August 11, 2005 Mrs. Moreno informed the 83rd Prosecutor’s Office that the Red de Apoyo would no longer be representing her in the case of the death of her husband Joe Castillo, and that henceforth it would be the Vicariate of Caracas. 87. On August 25, 200538, in response to a previous request by Mrs. Moreno’s attorney for a simple copy of the file No. C-585, the Director of the General Secretariat of the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic sent a communication to the 83rd Prosecutor’s Office requiring the original file mentioned, to be forwarded to the respective Office within three working days. 88. On October 19, 2006 the CICPC requested an “expert examination and ballistic comparison” of a “piece of metal from projectiles with bronze-colored armor,” in relation to case “G-410[-] 113” opened in connection with the attack suffered by Mr. Castillo, Mrs. Moreno and Luis Castillo (supra para. 46). This document suggested that the results should be “compared with those obtained when firing” certain weapons “related to criminal case number G-694 743", which is the case against the person allegedly involved in the attack against Joe Luis Castillo and his family (supra para. 78). Regarding this request, two days earlier the “security manager” of the "Clinica Hospital, C.A." had provided the CICPC with a bullet that had been extracted from Mrs. Moreno, indicating that it was the “only one found in his archives” and expressing his “commit[ment] to continue searching for those [...] extracted from [...] Luis Castillo.” 89. On November 28, 2006, the 20th Prosecutor’s Office, invoking Article 315 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter also “Procedural Code” or “COPP”)39, among others, decided to archive the proceedings related to the investigation, “on the grounds that these were insufficient to bring charges, without prejudice to their reopening, should new facts come to light.” On that same date a “notification slip” was sent to Mrs. Moreno informing her of this decision. The section of this document entitled “substantiation” states that “it is considered fully proven that a punishable act was committed, which is prosecutable ex officio [based on] the crimes of homicide and injuries described in the Criminal Code,” and that the victims of said incident were Mr. Castillo, Mrs. Moreno and Luis Castillo. It also stated that, having carried out the respective expert assessments, it appears that the gun used to shoot Mr. Castillo differs from the one seized from the person allegedly involved in the attack against him (supra para. 78). It then concluded that since “the investigative 38 From the files forwarded to the Court it is not clear that any procedures whatsoever were carried out between August 25, 2005 and October 19, 2006. Furthermore, it should be noted that during that period, on March 20, 2006 the petition was submitted to the Inter-American Commission (supra para. 2). 39 The Inter-American Commission, in the Merits Report, states that “Article 80 of the COPP [indicates that]: “Case closure by the State Prosecutor. Where the outcome of an investigation is insufficient to bring charges, the Office of the Attorney General shall order the proceedings closed, without prejudice to their reopening should new facts come to light. The victim in the proceeding shall be notified of this measure. All provisional measures issued against the accused in whose favor the decision to close is made shall cease. The victim may, at any juncture, request the reopening of the investigation indicating the relevant investigative procedures” (Merits file, Merits Report, page 23). 21