Report No. 25 (2009) IACHR. Petition No. 12.310 (Brasil)

• Case Number: 12.310
• Report Number: 25
• Year: 2009
• Petition Number: 12.310
• Case Type: Merits
• Court: Inter-American Comission of Human Rights
• Respondent State: Brasil
• Alleged Victim: Sebastião Camargo Filho

REPORT Nº 25/09 CASE 12.310 ADMISSIBILITY AND MERITS (PUBLICATION) SEBASTIÃO CAMARGO FILHO BRAZIL March 19, 2009 I. SUMMARY 1. On June 30, 2000, the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, or “MST”), the Pastoral Land Commission (Comissão Pastoral da Terra, or “CPT”), the Autonomous National Network of People’s Lawyers (Rede Nacional Autônoma de Advogados e Advogadas Populares, or “RENAAP”), the Global Justice Center (Centro de Justiça Global, or “CJG”), and the International Human Rights Law Group (hereinafter “the petitioners”) filed a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (“the Commission”) against the Federative Republic of Brazil (hereinafter “the State”), for violations of the right to life (Article 4), to humane treatment (Article 5), to a fair trial (Article 8), and to judicial protection (Article 25), in conjunction with a violation of the obligation of respecting those rights (Article 1.1), as set out in the American Convention on Human Rights (“the American Convention”), that allegedly occurred in connection with the murder of Sebastião Camargo on February 7, 1998, in the state of Paraná. 2. The petitioners claim that the failure to prevent and investigate the death of rural worker Sebastião Camargo Filho triggered the State’s international responsibility since it did not adopt measures to guarantee the right enshrined in Article 4 of the Convention. In addition, they state that more than eight years after the events, the case remains in a state of total judicial impunity, which contravenes the terms of Articles 8 and 25 of the American Convention. With respect to the admissibility requirements, the petitioners claim that the unwarranted delay in deciding on the judicial resources exempts them from the requirement of first exhausting all domestic remedies. They also note that they lodged the petition two years and four months after the incident, a period of time which they deem reasonable in light of the judicial delay. 3. The State, in turn, maintains that no state agents were involved in the case and that its agents have taken all the necessary steps to prosecute and punish the accused. Consequently, the State asks the Commission to rule that the petitions set out in the complaint are inadmissible. 4. Upon analyzing the admissibility of the case, the Commission concludes that it meets the formal admissibility requirements contained in Articles 46 and 47 of the Convention and proceeds with its analysis of the merits pursuant to Article 37(3) of it Rules of Procedure. In this report, the IACHR also concludes that the Brazilian State is responsible for violating the right to life, to a fair trial, and to judicial protection as set out, respectively, in Articles 4, 8, and 25 of the American Convention, all in connection with the obligation placed on the State by Article 1(1) thereof whereunder it is required to respect and ensure the rights enshrined in the Convention, with respect to Sebastião Camargo Filho and the members of his family. 5. As a consequence of the violations detected, the IACHR recommends that the State conduct a serious, impartial, and exhaustive investigation to determine the responsibility of all the perpetrators of the violations and, as applicable, to impose the appropriate legal penalties on the guilty. The IACHR recommends that the State make due reparations to the next-of-kin for the violations, and it recommends the adoption of measures to prevent violations of this kind from reoccurring in the future. II PROCESSING BY THE COMMISSION 6. On June 30, 2000, the Commission received the complaint and assigned it the number 12.310. On July 19, 2000, the Commission conveyed the petition to the State and granted it a period of three months in which to submit its comments. On December 7, 2000, the Commission repeated its request of July 19 and gave the State 45 days in which to respond. 7. On January 10, 2001, the State requested an additional 45 days in which to present its reply. On January 18, 2001, the IACHR gave the State an additional 45 days for submitting its comments. On October 15, 2002, during its 116th regular session, the Commission invited the parties to a working meeting to discuss the possibility of reaching a friendly settlement agreement. 8. On January 24, 2003, the Commission told the State that given its failure to respond to the requests for information made in June and December 2000, it had decided to enforce the provisions of Article 37(3) of its Rules of Procedure and defer its treatment of the case’s admissibility until the debate and decision on the merits. Consequently, the Commission asked the parties to submit their comments on the merits of the case within the following two months. 9. On March 17, 2003, the petitioners requested an additional 45 days in which to present their reply. On June 6, 2003, the Commission received a series of comments on the merits of the case from the petitioners. On October 14, 2003, a hearing was held during the 118th regular session, at which the Commission again made itself available to the parties to explore the possibility of reaching a friendly settlement agreement in the case. During the hearing, the State submitted a written document setting out its position regarding the case. On November 10, 2003, the IACHR received additional information from the petitioners, which was conveyed to the State the following December 12. III. POSITIONS OF THE PARTIES A. Petitioners 10. The petition indicates that in May 1997, the estates of Água da Prata and Dois Córregos, located in the municipality of Marilena, state of Paraná, were occupied by almost 200 families belonging to the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra). Some days after the occupation, representatives from the National Institute for Settlement and Agrarian Reform (Instituto Nacional de Colonização e Reforma Agrária, or “INCRA”), the Paraná State Government, and the Movement of Landless Rural Workers reached an agreement whereby the families agreed to leave the estates and relocate to the Boa Sorte and Santo Ângelo estates, which were to be declared of “social interest” by the Government. On November 19, 1997, the families occupied the Boa Sorte and Santo Ângelo estates, claiming that they had already been declared property of social interest. 11. According to the petitioners, on February 5, 1998, the workers who had settled on the estates went to the local authorities to express their concern regarding information that the Rural Democratic Union (União Democratica Ruralista, or UDR) was planning a violent eviction of the region’s estates. The petitioners claim that representatives of the workers reported these rumors to the Paraná state government’s Special Advisor for Agrarian Affairs, but their allegations were ignored and no protective measures were put in place. 12. The petitioners report that in the early morning hours of February 7, 1998, a group of some 30 armed individuals, allegedly hired and led by members of the UDR, embarked on a violent extrajudicial eviction at the Santo Ângelo estate. The gunmen, wearing hoods and black uniform shirts, violently forced the families to leave the area and get into a truck. From there, the hooded men continued on to the Boa Sorte estate, where they forced more than 70 families to remain on the ground, their faces turned downwards. 13. According to the petition, Sebastião Camargo Filho, a 65-year-old afro-descendant rural worker, father of two children, had a neck problem that prevented him from remaining in a crouched position, with his head pointing downwards. One of the hooded men, a leader of the operation, seeing that Sebastião Camargo was not obeying the order, aimed his 12-bore shotgun at the base of his neck and fired at him from a distance of less than one meter. Mrs. Antonia Franca, who was laying alongside Sebastião, suffered a number of gunpowder injuries to her body. The petitioners claim that several witness statements from the workers identified the gunman who shot Sebastião as Marcos Menezes Prochet, who at that time was serving as president of the Democratic Rural Union in the region. 14. The petitioners further report that the very same day, February 7, 1998, a police investigation into the eviction and the murder of Sebastião Camargo was launched. The authorities found large amounts of weapons and ammunition at the Boa Sorte and Santo Ângelo estates. The day after the eviction, following an anonymous call, the authorities arrested seven individuals suspected of involvement in the incident at the Figueira estate in Guairaçá municipality. Along with the suspects, an extensive number of large-gauge weapons and ammunition was found, including a hundred spent 12-bore cartridges, and unmarked black tee-shirts and hoods. That same day, the displaced families reoccupied the Água da Prata estate, where they found black hoods, two 12-bore shotguns, and cartridges for those weapons. The workers reported this find to the authorities the same day, but the police did not take the items into custody until six months later, on August 12, 1998. 15. On February 18, 1998, a warrant was issued for the preventive custody of Osnir Sanches, for his alleged involvement in hiring the gunmen and his participation in the events of February 7, 1998. Mr. Sanches fled from justice, was captured on June 2, 1998, and was later released, on June 18, 1998, under a writ of habeas corpus. The petitioners claim that in spite of the weighty evidence against them, the seven gunmen who had been arrested were released 35 days after being detained. 16. The petitioners claim that in spite of the multiple statements given during the police investigation...