A/76/168 accountability, notably by undermining the work of civil society, hum an rights defenders and others seeking to hold powerful actors to account. C. Delay 55. Although the prompt and expeditious investigation of credible allegations or suspected incidents of torture or ill-treatment is a fundamental dimension of the duty of States to investigate, there are often long delays across every stage of the investigative process, from the gathering of relevant evidence to the pursuit and conclusion of civil and criminal cases against perpetrators. Such delays can serve to degrade evidence, demoralize victims, exceed applicable statutes of limitations or undermine the establishment of truth about the relevant facts. Such delays may either be deliberately aimed at obstructing accountability, or simply be the product of deficient and/or underresourced investigatory mechanisms, yet the outcome of serious delays in accountability processes is equally obstructive, whether this is intended or not. 56. The Special Rapporteur has received extensive reports of the compounding of delays in the context of the ongoing pandemic crisis of many processes that enable victims or potential victims of torture or ill-treatment to obtain access to justice and/or seek to challenge their detention, where relevant. This exacerbates the vulnerability experienced by those victimized and/or deprived of their liberty. D. Scapegoating 57. One of the major shortcomings in the way accountability for torture and ill treatment is widely conceived and pursued is a tendency to view incidents of torture and ill-treatment as only implicating a few “bad apples”: isolated individuals or groups acting aberrantly in isolated incidents, who are then used as scapegoats for a structural or systemic problem. Indeed, experience demonstrates that cases of torture and ill-treatment rarely amount to isolated events and that State agents involved in such abuse are rarely prosecuted or punished. Rather, such acts are almost always part of a broader system or pattern of abuse, of which the relevant authorities are generally well aware if not implicated, and which is often sustained by normative, institutional and structural enabling factors. Unfortunately, when abuse is acknowledged, State responses regularly tend to perpetuate the few “bad apples” thesis: the idea that torture is typically a unique malevolent act undertaken by particularly corrupt or depraved individuals, rather than a practice allowed or even encouraged by existing laws, policies and behaviours. This in turn can allow States to deny the existence of any structural or systemic pattern and absolve themselves of broader institutional responsibility, and therefore also of the need to reform laws, policies and practices that encourage abuse or allow it to persist. E. Deficient and/or underfunded procedures 58. There is frequently a substantial gap between legal provisions and the reality faced by those seeking to hold individuals and authorities accountable for torture and ill-treatment. The mandate repeatedly observes and receives reports of various de facto limitations and obstacles arising across many different stages of the accountability process. These include, from the outset, barriers and delays in the exercise of the right of detainees to contact a third party or to receive legal assistance, delays or denials of access to an independent medical doctor, preventing prompt detection and documentation, lack of interpretation services for those who need them 18/23 21-09914