62nd
General Assembly
Mexico City, Mexico
September 29 to October 3, 2006
Camino Real Hotel
Reports and Resolutions
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IMPUNITY-BRAZIL
Resolution of the 62nd General Assembly
Mexico City, Mexico
September 29 – October 3, 2006
WHEREAS
Marcone Sarmento, charged with involvement in the January 14, 1998 murder of
Manoel Leal de Oliveira in Itabuna, Bahía, was acquitted in December
2005; the prosecution filed an appeal, which is still pending; Mozart Brasil,
another defendant in the case, was sentenced to 18 years in prison but was freed
following a habeas corpus hearing and is now free pending his appeal; the mastermind
has not been identified, and the prosecution believes that the police investigation
has not yielded sufficient evidence to identify the mastermind; the investigation
at the state level is not going well, possibly because police officers and politicians
are involved with the masterminds
WHEREAS
the judge is to decide whether to admit the complaint and submit it to the court
to have former Eunápolis mayor Paulo Dapé and staff members Maria
José Ferreira Souza (“Maria Sindoiá”), Waldemir Batista
de Oliveira (“Dudu”), and Antônio Oliveira Santos (“Toninho
da Caixa”) tried for killing radio journalist Ronaldo Santana de Araújo
on October 9, 1997 in Eunápolis, Bahía; there have been several
attempts to postpone the trial, and the defendants can still appeal the judge’s
ruling; Paulo Sérgio Mendes Lima, also charged with carrying out the
murder, was sentenced to 19 years in prison on November 23, 2002 and said Paulo
Dapé had arranged the murder
WHEREAS
the investigation into the killing of Nivanildo Barbosa Lima, whose body was
found in Paulo Alfonso Dam on July 22, 1995, was reopened; further work was
done on the case, including by the Public Prosecutor’s Office; and the
case is now before the court for the judge to review
WHEREAS
the primary defendant in the August 16, 2001 murder of Mário Coelho de
Almeida in Magé, Rio de Janeiro was former councilman Genivaldo Ferreira
Nogueira, who was acquitted on June 30, 2005 due to a lack of evidence; the
mastermind behind the murder has yet to be convicted; the other defendant, Reynaldo
Polary Stumpf, was at large for a long time but is now behind bars; the judge
convicted and sentenced him, but his lawyer has appealed
WHEREAS
of those people charged in the July 5, 1989 murder of society columnist Maria
Nilce Magalhães in Vitória, Espírito Santo, Marcos Egydio
Costa was sentenced to nine years in prison without parole and José Alayr
Andreatta, to 14 years in prison without parole, while Romualdo Eustáquio
da Luz Faria and César Narcizo da Silva are scheduled for trial on December
11, 2006; the trial of the other defendant, police officer Charles Roberto Lisboa,
was stayed because he was found to be mentally ill; however, the new prosecutor
in the case will ask that this decision be reviewed because she does not agree
with it and she believes there were numerous irregularities in the investigation
WHEREAS
the investigation into the October 29, 1997 murder of Edgar Lopes de Faria (aka
Escaramuça) in Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, was set aside on January
31, 2006 at the request of the Public Prosecutor’s Office after André
Matsushita Gonçalves, a police captain assigned to the special organized
crime unit (UNICOC), completed his investigation
WHEREAS
the mastermind who ordered the March 10, 1998 murder of radio journalist José
Carlos Mesquita in Ouro Preto do Oeste, Rondônia has never been identified;
one person is in custody, while other suspects are dead or have disappeared;
neither the police nor prosecutors have new leads in the case
WHEREAS
radio journalist José Wellington Fernandes, aka Zezinho Cazuza, was killed
on March 13, 2000 in Canindé de São Francisco, Sergipe, and the
primary suspect, former mayor Genivaldo Galindo da Silva is in custody for unrelated
administrative cases; his trial for the Cazuza murder will begin on February
13, 2007 in the city of Propriá (the venue was changed to guard against
outside pressures)
WHEREAS
Fernando Mariano da Silva Filho, Marcelo de Melo, and Helton Jonas Gonçalves
de Oliveira were charged with aggravated murder in the April 24, 2004 killing
of radio journalist José Carlos Araújo in Timbaúba, Pernambuco,
but Oliveira is the only one of the three defendants who is in custody, with
the other two still at large; Oliveira’s trial is to be moved to the provincial
capital, Recife, but this change of venue was not confirmed until September
18, 2006
WHEREAS
the police identified eight people involved in the June 30, 2003 murder of radio
journalist Nicanor Linhares Batista in Limoeiro do Norte, Ceará, and
the case is awaiting the judge’s decision as to whether the defendants
are to be tried by jury; the prosecutor in Limoeiro do Norte, Alexandre Pontes
Aragão, submitted an addendum to the complaint against former Mayor Arivan
Lucena, who is charged with masterminding the murder, but the trial was suspended
by the court while it determines whether Judge José Maria Lucena, the
husband of Arivan, was involved
WHEREAS
of the nine people believed to have been involved in the April 2004 murder of
journalist Samuel Román in Coronel Sapucaia, Mato Grosso do Sul, the
court pressed upheld the charges against Cleyton de Andrade Segovia, former
Mayor Eurico Mariano (who is charged with masterminding the murder), and Alfredo
Rui Dias Arevalos; all of the defendants have appealed and their appeal is still
pending; Segovia was freed following a habeas corpus hearing and fled; and the
other suspects could not even be charged because either their whereabouts are
unknown or they are dead
WHEREAS
Aristeu Guida da Silva was murdered on May 12, 1995 in São Fidélis,
Rio de Janeiro, and Vladimir Rainieri Pereira Sobrosa, charged with carrying
out the murder, was sentenced to 28 years in prison in April 2002; he appealed
the verdict and was retried, but his attorneys had the trial stayed on the grounds
that a witness was missing; two other defendants, one of whom is a police officer,
remain at large; and there have been no further developments in the trial since
2002
WHEREAS
in the investigation into the murder of radio journalist Jorge Vieira da Costa,
who was killed in March 2001 in Timon, Maranhão, witnesses were pressured
and the prosecutor noted errors; three people were convicted of carrying out
the crime, but they appealed and the court is now hearing their appeal; three
people charged with masterminding the murder managed to obstruct the proceedings;
the prosecution filed an appeal with the Superior Court, but this appeal is
still pending; and the person charged with killing Vieira was arrested for another
crime in Teresina
WHEREAS
Domingos Sávio Brandão de Lima, owner of the daily Folha do Estado
of Mato Grosso and the radio station Cidade de Cuiabá FM, was murdered
on September 30, 2002, and the perpetrators were convicted; the mastermind,
João Arcanjo Ribeiro, who is allegedly an organized crime boss, was extradited
from Uruguay to Brazil and is being held at the Pascoal Ramos Penitentiary;
the judge will soon hear final arguments to decide whether the case will be
brought to trial; former military policeman Célio Alves de Souza, who
was convicted in June 2005 to 17 years and six months in prison for his involvement
in the murder, escaped from the same prison on July 24, 2005 and remains at
large.
WHEREAS
the investigation into the August 29, 1995 murder of journalist Reinaldo Coutinho
da Silva in São Gonçalo, Rio de Janeiro was on hold for a long
time until prosecutor Rubem Vianna decided to follow another lead; and there
has been more than one change in the prosecutors assigned to the case
WHEREAS
the investigation into the July 11, 2004 murder of radio journalist Jorge Lourenço
dos Santos in Santana do Ipanema, Alagoas was transferred by the Public Prosecutor’s
Office to the regional police station in 2005, and the regional police was asked
to work further on the case; but the station has a new captain, witnesses are
hard to find, no new leads have emerged, and as a result the case is at a virtual
standstill
WHEREAS
Principle 4 of the Declaration of Chapultepec states: “Freedom of expression
and of the press are severely limited by murder, terrorism, kidnapping, intimidation,
the unjust imprisonment of journalists, the destruction of facilities, violence
of any kind and impunity for perpetrators. Such acts must be investigated promptly
and punished harshly”
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF
THE IAPA RESOLVES
to ask the federal government
to have federal police take over investigations into crimes against journalists,
as these murders are generally in retaliation for reporting by journalists in
their respective cities and the investigations may be subject to local pressure
and interference
to request that the Witness
Protection Program be improved and expanded, as it currently places witnesses
in extremely vulnerable conditions, and thus many opt out of the program
to demand that police and
the courts not limit their investigations to identifying and arresting gunmen
and intermediaries, but that they also include the masterminds who ordered the
crimes
to ask the Public Safety
Department in each state to take the steps needed to prevent those people involved
in these crimes from fleeing
to ask the members of the
public prosecutor’s office in each state to devote effort to following
up on investigations and see that further work is done to identify the culprits
and ensure that trials proceed without being interrupted every time there is
a new prosecutor or police captain.
 questions
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