-2386.
According to the representatives, the Ministry of Defense did deposit the rest of the
reparations ordered on July 23, 2008 (supra paras. 79 and 80) for the legal heirs of Ms.
Tarazona Arrieta and Ms. Pérez Chávez, as well as for Mr. Bejarano Laura, before July 2011.109
87.
Therefore, the State paid the totality of the compensation ordered by the court.
VIII.
MERITS
88.
With regard to the alleged violations of the rights recognized by the Convention in the
present case, the Court will analyze: 1) the rights to judicial guarantees and to judicial
protection of the next of kin of Ms. Tarazona Arrieta and Ms. Pérez Chávez, as well as those
of Mr. Bejarano Laura; 2) the right to life of Ms. Tarazona Arrieta and Ms. Pérez Chávez, and
the right to personal integrity of Mr. Bejarano Laura; 3) The right to personal integrity of the
next of kin of Ms. Tarazona Arrieta, Ms. Pérez Chávez and the family members of Mr. Bejarano
Laura, and 4) the duty to adapt the domestic law.
VIII-1.
THE RIGHTS TO JUDICIAL GUARANTEES AND TO JUDICIAL PROTECTION
A. Arguments of the parties and of the Commission
89.
The Commission alleged that the investigation carried out at the domestic level was
not completed within a reasonable time. With regard to the domestic court hearing, the
Commission pointed out that the Office of the Prosecutor never requested the rifles of the
other 15 members of the patrol; never subjected the rifles to a parafin test; never
reconstructed the scene of the crime or made a forensic planimetry. It added that the accused
was not placed at the disposal of the Office of the Prosecutor by the Army, although he was
being held in military installations and was subject to an arrest warrant. The Commission also
claimed that it was proved that for seven years (from December 12, 1995 to January 21,
2003, date on which the case file was removed from the archive) the next of kin of the alleged
victims did not have an effective recourse to guarantee their rights due to the application of
Amnesty Laws Nos. 26.492 and 26.479, which was a factor in the delay in the investigations.
With regard to the period from the removal of the case from the archive to the reaffirmation
of the conviction, the Commission argued that the investigation of the Office of the Prosecutor
displayed a lack of interest.110 In addition, it indicated that, since the removal of the case
from the archive, no effort had been made to locate Sgt. Evangelista Pinedo and it was not
until two years later that the authorities discovered that he was in prison for the commission
of a different crime.
90.
The representatives argued that there was an infringement of the right to a “natural
judge” and to due process of law, in relation to the right to access to justice of the victims
and their family members, due to the assumption of the case by the military court, which was
“manifestly incompetent” to hear it. They also maintained that the investigation had not been
Informed by the petitioners in their communication of July 27, 2011. Cf. Inter-American Commission on
Human Rights. Merits Report 77/12, Tarazona Arrieta et al. November 8, 2012, para. 120 (evidence file, folio 33).
109
Specifically, it pointed out that the Office of the Prosecutor requested on four occasions an extension of the
period of committal proceedings and that when that Office presented the complaint, it had not pursued procedures
different than those before the case was closed.
110