E/CN.4/1997/7/Add.3 page 16 of the PTJ said, however, that although the PTJ's conduct in this respect had been above reproach, he had no objection to this type of investigation being conducted by another body. 53. The different points made in the preceding pages, in particular the inadequacy or negligence of the Public Prosecutor's Office and the members of the Institute of Forensic Medicine, the lack of transparency of the various police forces alleged to be implicated, the obstacles in the way of exercising the right to a defence, etc. all combine when it comes to establishing responsibility for the commission of acts of torture. They are compounded by the shortcomings in the functioning of judicial bodies, concerning which the Special Rapporteur received repeated criticism from both non-governmental and academic sources, government authorities and representatives of the judiciary. 54. The Special Rapporteur did not hear of a single case where the perpetrators of acts of torture had been sentenced, which is surprising in view of the significant number of complaints and the fact that the authorities themselves recognize that cases do occur. During his visit, he received replies from the Attorney-General's Office regarding 18 cases, including seven collective cases, which the Special Rapporteur had transmitted to the 15 Government at various times. In five of these cases, the Attorney-General's Office said that it had received no complaint, or that the alleged victim had not appeared to confirm the facts of the complaint. In two cases the judge had declared the inquiry terminated by prescription of the criminal proceedings, after the injuries concerned had been described as slight. In one case, where the person had been found dead and showed signs of torture, three officials of the Metropolitan Police had been sentenced in 1994 to seven years and six months for the offence of homicide, after which they had been granted a suspended sentence on 27 June 1995. Two cases had been assigned to 16 the military jurisdiction. One of these was in the pre-trial stage, while the other, in which the victim had died, had been investigated by a military court, after which the President of the Republic had decided, in application 17 of article 224 of the Code of Military Justice, to file the case. In eight cases, the Attorney-General's Office reported that the Office of the Public Prosecutor had either requested a nudo hecho inquiry, or had brought judicial charges against police officials for inflicting injuries, and that the judicial inquiry had not yet been completed. The facts, however, dated back respectively to April 1992, May 1993, January 1992, October 1991 (three cases), February 1992 and October 1995 (the most recent). In one of the cases, the Attorney-General's Office reported that a nudo hecho procedure had been requested in December 1991, and the outcome of preliminary procedures had to be awaited before charges could be brought. 55. The above situation raises the issue of the way the judicial bodies operate, a subject which the Special Rapporteur found to be of great concern to the persons he interviewed, and the general lines of which may be summarized in the following comment by Professor Julio César Fernández Toro in a United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) publication: “Despite the favourable treatment given in the Constitution and in a large part of Venezuelan legislation to the consecration and development of personal rights, the latter cannot effectively be exercised. There is a wide gap as a result between formal law and the exercise of rights