To foresee, see and remedy: state responsibilities for investigating torture
is a particularly violent notion, since it is precisely the
action of the judiciary that is supposed to prosecute and
punish torture. Any evidence obtained under torture
must be deemed as contaminated; any judicial process
that relies on evidence obtained through torture must
be revised, and declared null and void if appropriate.
An efficient investigation discharges some of the state’s responsibilities, but its main purpose and outcome is to ensure
redress for the violation which the state incurred, and nonrepetition. The state obligation to provide redress for human
rights violations is a principle of law and entails the duty to
redress the consequences of the violation, ideally through restitutio in integrum. In most cases of human rights violations
(and arguably in all torture cases), in which such integral restitution is not possible, other measures must come into play to
ensure full reparation. Redress for torture acts must address
physical, psychological and material damage. Redress measures include:
• Cessation, aimed at ensuring the end not only of the
acts of torture but – just as essentially – of the denial
of justice that is oftentimes created by the absence of
an impartial and prompt investigation. Cessation measures also include measures of non-repetition (particularly measures conducive to install the legal, regulatory
and practical framework necessary to ensure that the
violation will not re-occur).
• Restoration, aimed at re-establishing the situation that
existed prior to the violation. One example of particular
relevance is the revision of judicial processes in which
evidence obtained through torture was utilised; others
are measures of legal, professional or medical rehabilitation.
• Satisfaction, which includes measures of determination
and acknowledgement of responsibility, acts of constriction, publicity of the findings on an investigation
on torture, or measures of commemoration and remembrance.
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