4
have not left, but instead they are present in the reflections and dreams of the
survivors of the massacre of the Prison of Castro Castro. She added that everything
is at a halt until “justice may be served”. But, in the meantime, time goes by, “we
get older and justice does not come and the clock keeps ticking. Many of us have
not been able to become mothers yet;” there is a right to memory that “is part of
the right to truth”, and in the present case, “we made an over human effort to
present evidence that will allow us a judgment “that will protect” this group of
victims." 9
14.
In reality, we can extract some reflections and lessons from this dramatic
argument. We formed here a cruel décalage between, on one hand, chronological
and biological time, and, on the other, psychological time. Chronological and
biological time continue to flow, increasing the victim’s despair, who grow older in
the darkness of impunity. Psychological time immobilizes the natural course of life,
since the realization of justice must be sought, which takes time.
15.
Similarly, given the extreme cruelty of the suffering inflicted on the victims
of the Prison of Castro Castro (infra), many of them were deprived of their
existential time (41 deceased victims identified up to this date). Others saw their
biological time significantly reduced, in reason, v.g. of the handicaps, of damage to
the lungs and skin, of blindness in one eye, of the destruction in tissues, of greater
vulnerability to cancer. 10 The victims were arbitrarily deprived of time of life, and, in
many cases (41 already identified), of life itself.
16.
In my personal image, I cannot escape the impression that may of the
victims bombed in the brutal armed attack of the Castro Castro Prison (pavilion 1A)
seem Joans of Arc of the end of the XX century (without any intention of
canonizing). But the same as the historical character (born in Domrémy, Vosgos, on
01.06.1412, and who died on 05.30.1431), they had their ideas to free the social
environment, for which they were imprisoned, some submitted to a trial without
means of defense, and some were not even given this opportunity; in the
mentioned armed attack, many died little after the bombing; at the same time,
Joan of Arc, as is known, was convicted to be burnt at the stake. Unfortunately, the
victimization and savagery continue after the centuries, in different continents.
IV.
The Legal Facts and Persons.
17.
In what refers to the millennial human brutality, the facts by long surpass
human imagination. When you think you have imagined the worst, along comes a
fact that proves that human beings are capable of more in the brutal treatment
given to their piers:
"Within the building, the roar of the gun shots, with a deafening echo in the
limited space of the hall had caused panic. During the first moments they thought that
the soldiers were going to break into the rooms shooting everything they found in their
way, that the Government had changed its mind, choosing the massive physical
liquidation (...). They saw the bodies piled up, the winding blood slowly moving
through the tile as if it were alive, and the boxes of food. (...) Danger lurks the
careless, in those lifeless bodies, especially in the blood; who could know what vapors,
what emanations, what poisonous miasmas could already have been released from the
destroyed meat of the blind. They are dead, they cannot do anything to us, someone
.
Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), Transcription of the Public Hearing in the case
of the Prison of Castro Castro, the 26th and 27th days of June 2006, at San Salvador, El Salvador, pp.
116 (internal circulation).
9
.
10
Paragraphs 186, 187, 216, and 433 (c) of the present Judgment.