-113174. As a result of the exhumations carried out on those ranches between April 10 and 16, 1990, 24 bodies were found and transferred to the San Jerónimo hospital in Montería. Regarding these measures, the body of evidence contains only two official records and a note on the official procedure for the removal of the bodies (supra paras. 95(71) to 95(73)). Moreover, the official record of the exhumation of corpses of April 12, 1990, signed by the 19th Criminal Court of first instance, during the recovery of the remains found at “Las Tangas” that same day, stated that: […] When the work began, a bulldozer was used that apparently belonged to the owner of the ranch, operated by a member of the Elite Corps [of the National Police]; however, the use of this machine had to be suspended owing to mechanical problems. It should be noted that the place where the procedure was carried out is on the left bank of the Sinú River; work continued using picks and shovels to remove the earth […]232 It is clear that this procedure could have destroyed or lost evidence, even though there is no evidence to prove this. 175. In addition, the negligence of the authorities responsible for the exhumations and the hospital personnel is clear during the procedures for the identification of the bodies in the San Jerónimo Hospital in Montería. The next of kin of those who were disappeared in Pueblo Bello received little or no information or collaboration from these authorities, so that they had to proceed for themselves to examine the corpses which were decomposed and had been thrown on the floor of the “amphitheater” of this hospital (supra para. 95(74)). The State did not contest this fact. The testimonies of Leovigilda Villalba Sánchez, María Cecilia Ruiz de Álvarez, Euclides Manuel Calle Álvarez, Genaro Benito Calderón Ruiz and Manuel Dolores López Cuadro (supra para. 65(b), (d), (g), (h) and (i)) are more than eloquent in this regard. 176. On April 19, 1990, four inhabitants of Pueblo Bello made statements and declared that they had identified the bodies of Ricardo Bohórquez, Andrés Manuel Peroza Jiménez, Juan Luis Escobar Duarte, José Leonel Escobar Duarte, Ovidio Carmona Suárez and Jorge David Martínez Moreno (supra para. 95(75)). Even though they had not been recognized or identified, the rest of the corpses were buried in a common grave in the San Antonio cemetery in Montería. The authorities responsible for the investigation did not try to reinitiate the search for the bodies in this place or any other. The subsequent procedures were carried out between March 27 and April 7, 1995, when the Technical Investigation Corps of the Prosecutor General’s Office exhumed and removed 12 bodies from this cemetery; however, the osseous remains were not examined until June 1997 (supra paras. 95(82) and 95(83)). Moreover, these procedures did not lead to the identification of any of those who disappeared from Pueblo Bello. 177. In this regard, based on the United Nations Manual on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extralegal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions, this Court has defined the guiding principles that should be observed when it is considered that a death may be due to extrajudicial execution. The State authorities that conduct an investigation must try, as a minimum, inter alia to: (a) identify the victim; (b) recover and preserve the probative material related to the death to contribute to any possible criminal investigation into those responsible; (c) identify possible witnesses and obtain their statements in relation to the death under 232 Cf. official record of the exhumation of corpses of April 12, 1990, issued by the 19th Criminal Court of first instance (file of attachments to the requests and arguments brief, tome V, attachment 7(2), folio 1643).