DISSENTING OPINION OF JUDGE MEDINA-QUIROGA IN THE JUDGMENT OF THE INTER-AMERICAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE CASE OF GARCÍAASTO AND RAMÍREZ-ROJAS REGARDING ARTICLE 9 1. I dissent from the majority opinion of the Court that held that Article 9 had not been violated, except in relation to some of the grounds invoked by the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights and by the victims’ representatives. For clarification purposes, I would like to note here that there are two victims in the instant case, Wilson García-Asto and Urcesino Ramírez-Rojas, as a result of acts perpetrated by each of them, having no connection to one another, and that the alleged violations brought before the Inter-American Commission would have allegedly been the result of the application of various criminal provisions in two different proceedings instituted against each of them. Case of Wilson García-Asto 2. On July 14, 1997, in the first proceedings instituted against him, Wilson GarcíaAsto was convicted of the crimes of collaboration with terrorism and membership in and affiliation with a terrorist organization, as defined in Articles 4 and 5 of DecreeLaw No. 25.475. The Court held that both crimes were mutually exclusive and incompatible based, inter alia, on the order to commence the pre-trial investigation in the second criminal proceedings instituted against Mr. García, which stated that being a member of a terrorist organization in itself amounts to terrorist association, whereas in the case of the crime of collaboration it is required that the person is not a member of the organization (paragraph 199 of the majority judgment). Based on the foregoing, the Court found that Article 9 of the Convention had been violated. However, the two crimes he was charged with were not deemed to be incompatible with the principle of nullum crimen nulla poena sine lege praevia. In relation to those crimes, in paragraph 195 of the judgment, the Court referred to paragraph 127 of the judgment rendered in the Case of Lori Berenson in order to affirm its finding that Article 4 of Decree-Law No. 25.475 does not violate Article 9 and to hold that “[t]his same finding extends to the crime of membership in or affiliation with a terrorist organization as defined in Article 322 of the Criminal Code of 1991, with which Urcesino Ramírez-Rojas was charged in the second proceedings brought against him, and to Article 5 of Decree-Law No. 25.475, with which Wilson García-Asto was charged in the second proceedings instituted against him.” I dissented from the majority’s opinion in the Case of Lori Berenson for the reasons stated therein. 3. In the second criminal proceedings, Mr. García was accused of the crime of membership in and affiliation with a terrorist organization, as defined in Article 5 of Decree-Law No. 25.475, which was held by the Court to be compatible with Article 9 of the Convention (paragraphs 203 and 204 of the majority judgment). On February 9, 2005, the Supreme Court of Justice of Peru entered a final judgment on the case, acquitting Mr. García.