2 Instance, and decision and judgment No. 18 of November 4, 1997. It absolved Canese of guilt and pardoned him. Decision and judgment No. 804 of April 27, 2004, of the Supreme Court of Justice admitted the petition for clarification filed by Mr. Canese against decision and judgment No. 1362 of December 11, 2002, and ordered the complainant to pay the costs of the entire proceedings. The Supreme Court of Justice considered that the plaintiff had failed to expedite the action (six months) – interlocutory order No. 1645; this constitutes a reluctance to use the supervisory powers (facultades ordenatorias) recognized in procedural legislation and, basically, the obligation to apply the Constitution over and above any procedural obstacle or tactic, at least in cases such as this one, in which the passage of time made the arbitrariness to which Mr. Canese was subjected more evident every day (see Sapena, Josefina. Constitutional case law. Arbitrariness 1). In this respect, the Inter-American Court has firmly established that judges “who are in charge of directing the proceeding, have the duty to direct and channel the judicial proceeding with the aim of not sacrificing justice and due legal process to formalism and impunity,” 2 which is what evidently happened in the instant case, directly affecting Mr. Canese’s constitutional rights. 4. In interlocutory order No. 409 of April 29, 1994, the First Judge of First Instance for Civil Affairs prevented his departure from the country. The request for authorization to leave the country occupies a special chapter and this is how the Inter-American Court considered it, because it was obviously not a tactic for absconding. The judge, or the judges who refused the requests to leave the country, and those who allowed this to continue over such a long period of time, evidently violated constitutional guarantees and the rights established in the Convention. Clearly, responsibilities should be disaggregated and determined in due course, because the responsibility of the judge who denied permission differs from that of the judge who allowed the restriction to be maintained for such a long time, and from that of the judge who intervened for a short time. 5. Freedom of the press and public interest. The debate occurred on a matter of public interest, an aspect that was obviously not considered by the judges involved in the case. This is the only way to understand the extreme severity in the criteria adopted, which converted a simple trial for slander and injuria, at least in the sphere of precautionary measures, into a typical case of judicial arbitrariness. More than eight years without any judicial instance using its supervisory powers (facultades ordenatorias) to guide the proceeding back to its normal channels. The complainants were private individuals, not the Paraguayan State. The case involved a conflict between individuals on matters of evident public interest. The partners of CONEMPA were involved in matters of public interest and, consequently, the primacy of this over private interests must be 1 Sapena, Josefina. Constitutional case law 2 Case of Myrna Mack-Chang, para. 211.