indicating that to do so it was necessary to eradicate the sources of risk and prevent the death of
another beneficiary. Likewise, Venezuela was ordered to provide immediate and effective security
to each of the beneficiaries of the measures, by means of permanent guard measures, as well as
to the homes of Maritza Barrios and Orismar Carolina Alzul García, and to agree on more
comprehensive provisional measures in the context of the dialogue between beneficiaries and the
State.
6.
Based on the information and the requests submitted by the parties, in this Order the Court
shall address the following issues: (a) the request to lift the provisional measures ordered in favor
of Yelitza Lugo Pelaes and Orismar Carolina Alzul García; (b) the request to lift the provisional
measures ordered in favor of Nestor Caudi Barrios and Víctor Daniel Cabrera Barrios; (c) the facts
related to the deaths of Víctor Tomás Navarro Barrios and Jorge Antonio Barrios, and the status of
the implementation of the provisional measures regarding the rest of the beneficiaries, and d) the
duty of the State to provide information.
A) Regarding the request to lift the measures issued in favor of Yelitza Lugo Pelaes and
Orismar Carolina Alzul García
7.
The State reported that during a hearing held on March 7, 2012 it was agreed to suspend
the domestic measures of protection in favor of Yelitza Lugo Pelaes, Dalila Ortuño and Orismar
Carolina Alzul and their respective families, “given that, as recorded in the transcripts of the
interviews on the measures of protection, these persons expressly renounced these measures.”
The State provided a copy of the transcripts of those interviews, and indicated that they were
carried out “in the presence of social workers and a psychologist attached to the Victims’
Assistance Unit.” Consequently, the State requested the “[l]ifting of provisional measures in favor
of the citizens Yelitza Lugo Pelae[s], Dalila Ortuño and Orismar Carolina Alzul García, given their
express renunciation of these.”
8.
For their part, the representatives alleged that, based on the statements taken at the
interviews it appears that these “were conducted with the clear objective of securing the lifting of
the provisional measures and not to learn about the situation of risk affecting [the beneficiaries]
and their families.” The representatives also provided a “sworn statement by [Carolina Orismar
Alzul] where she denies the content of the interview transcripts and says she was deceived.” In
response to the State’s objection (infra considering para. 10), the representatives stressed that
“the lack of authentication of the sworn statement should not affect its content, as the State seeks
to suggest.” In this regard, they emphasized that “in previous cases [they have] had major
difficulties in authenticating statements.”
9.
In the aforementioned sworn statement, the beneficiary stated that “[o]n March [1] […]
2012 […] [she] was interviewed by a psychologist who works in the victims’ assistance unit, [who]
said she was there on behalf of Mr. Luis Aguilera, [representative of the victim, and] proceed[ed]
to ask [her] several questions [including whether] officials had threatened [her… and] if she was
satisfied with the measures of protection, to [which she] responded that […] the national guards
had been to […] her mother’s house [, where she lives,] only twice, and that [she did] not feel
satisfied with the protection measures, whereupon the official prepared a transcript in her own
handwriting and asked [her] to sign it, [and], believing in the honesty of this official, [she]
proceed[ed] to sign the transcript.” The beneficiary also stated that “[she] has never had
protection, so she could hardly renounce something that has never existed; however [she] is not
opposed to the Inter-American Court maintaining the measures of protection in [her] favor.” In
this regard, she indicated that she “[d]oes not know the address of […] the Victims’ Assistance
Unit”, that she “[has] never been summoned by [that U]nit […] to a meeting to discuss the scope
of the measures” and that she does “not have the money to cover travel expenses when the Court
of Control summons [her] to a hearing. ”
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