19 appraisals, inspections, evidence, summonses of witnesses; and testimony of AttorneyGeneral Alicia Duarte-Bojorge; the Seventh Judge of the Criminal District, Boanerges OjedaBaca, and Raymond Genie-Peñalba). 71. It has been proven that the Supreme Court of Justice of Nicaragua, despite the considerable time that has elapsed and the various requests from the parties for a ruling, has not settled the application for judicial review (Application for judicial review filed by Mr. Raymond Genie-Peñalba on August 29, 1994; incident of abandonment of the application for judicial review submitted by the defense of September 8, 1994; briefs from the defense of August 7, 1995, and August 21, 1996; briefs from Raymond Genie-Peñalba of September 28 and October 24, 1994, June 7 and October 3, 1995, and February 2, May 29, July 28, and November 4, 1996; brief from Magistrate Alba Luz Ramos-Vanegas of June 12, 1996, and testimony of Raymond Genie-Peñalba). 72. It has been proven that the application of Decrees 591 and 600 concerning military trials in Nicaragua did not violate the principle of equality, did not provoke capitis diminutio of Mr. Raymond Genie-Peñalba, nor did it diminish the independence or impartiality of the military tribunals, inasmuch as Article 243 of Decree 591, which provides that the Supreme Court of Justice handling the pending application for judicial review be constituted with four additional members from the military appointed by the Sandinista Popular Army's High Command and the Senior Official of the Ministry of the Interior, was not applied in this case. It has not been proven that the principle of predominance of the "Sandinista juridical conscience" was applied in the rulings of the military courts. (judgment of June 27, 1994, of the Military Tribunal of First Instance of the Armed Forces' Military Advocate; Judgment of August 19, 1994 of the Army High Command constituted as a Tribunal of Second Instance; and closing arguments of the Government and the Commission). 73. It has not been proven that Mr. Raymond Genie-Peñalba exercised the simple and prompt recourse referred to in Article 25 of the American Convention. VIII 74. Article 8 of the American Convention which concerns the right to a fair trial establishes the main lines of what is known as "due process of law" or "the right to legal defense," which consist of the right of every person to a hearing, with due guarantees and within a reasonable time, by a competent, independent, and impartial tribunal, previously established by law, in the substantiation of any accusation of a criminal nature made against him or for the determination of his rights and obligations of a civil, labor, fiscal, or any other measure. 75. In order to establish violation of Article 8, it is necessary, first of all, to establish whether the accusing party's procedural rights were respected in the trial to determine those responsible for the death of young Genie-Lacayo. 76. There is abundant evidence in the Case file to show that certain military authorities either obstructed or refused to collaborate adequately in the investigations by the Office of the Attorney-General and with the judge of first instance (supra 68). The situation reached the point where that court was constrained to contact the President of the Republic by letter of January 21, 1992, -which appears in the Case file,- to intercede with the military authorities for them to afford the facilities needed for the inspection of Military Unit 003, and that unit's weapons, vehicles and weapons log (supra 68). In accordance with the foregoing, the judge in charge of the case until he declared himself incompetent encountered problems, generated by the authorities, in collecting the evidence he