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GUATEMALA'S HIGHEST COURT DISMANTLES KEY MASSACRE CASE; MASS MURDERERS COULD WALK.

Article Excerpt
Guatemala's Corte de Constitucionalidad (CC) has struck down the legal basis of a case against 16 Army officers accused of orchestrating the massacre at Dos Erres in the department of Peten during the 36-year internal war that officially ended in December 1996. In a decision reached in December 2004, but withheld until February 2005, the CC declared null all proceedings against the 16 in a Juzgado de Instancia during the last nine years. The decision ordered the judge controlling the investigations of the case to suspend any further action and nullify any action taken since the Congress passed the Ley de Reconciliacion Nacional in 1966.

The decree further stipulated that any such acts that took place during the war must be submitted to deliberation by the Corte de Apelaciones before being tried in the appropriate court to decide whether they are subject to termination. The CC held that the court in the Dos Erres case omitted this step.

The decision infuriated accusers because the case had been submitted to a Sala de Apelaciones, which concluded that it was not covered by the amnesty of the Ley de Reconciliacion. The submission occurred, however, some months after the trial case had begun.

"This is precisely what we base the inappropriateness of the decision on. If there was a ruling that dictated that the Dos Erres case...

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