108
involvement of different army and police units, who, together with the rondines, allegedly
perpetrated a massacre of Mara 18 gang members. The final outcome of the incident is
said to have been 69 killed and 39 injured. According to available information, when the
security forces entered the prison the death toll is thought to have been no more than 10
(including gang members and rondines); however, all the fatalities that occurred thereafter
corresponded to Mara 18 members. The IACHR was informed that after the army units
arrived, the rondines set fire to cellblocks 2 and 6 where most of the gang members were
housed, resulting in the deaths of 25 of the latter; other gang members who were injured
343
and had surrendered were allegedly executed by the rondines and security forces.
304.
Furthermore, in the case of Orlando Olivares et al., which the
Commission recently declared admissible, it was alleged that on November 10, 2003,
members of the Venezuelan National Guard extra judicially executed seven inmates, who
had surrendered and were unarmed in the context of an operation to control a supposed
riot at Bolívar State Judicial Confinement Center (also known as Vista Hermosa Prison).
According to the petitioners, after the situation had been brought under control, the
security forces reportedly forced the inmates outside and placed them on the sports field
where they physically assaulted them, beating them with baseball bats, pipes, rifles, and
metal bars. After that, they apparently took presumed cellblock leaders and executed
344
them, the latter being the seven alleged victims in the case.
Other forms of mistreatment resulting in death
305.
As this report shows in the next chapter, which concerns the right to
humane treatment, in performing its various functions the IACHR has found that the use of
torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment on individuals in State custody
remains one of the principal human rights problems in the region. In this context, the Inter‐
American human rights system has examined cases in which the nature and intensity of the
assault have caused the traumatic death of the victim.
306.
Thus, for example, in the Bulacio case, the Inter‐American Court found
that the victim, a 17‐year‐old youth, who was detained on April 19, 1991, as part of a mass
arrest (or razzia), died seven days later as a result of "cranial traumatism" caused by a
savage beating to which he was subjected by police officers. 345
343
IACHR, Public hearing: Situation of the Persons Deprived of Liberty in Honduras, 124° Ordinary
Period of Sessions, Participants: State of Honduras, Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), Comité para la
Defensa de los Derechos Humanos en Honduras (CODEH), Comité de Familiares de Detenidos y Desaparecidos de
Honduras (COFADEH) and Centro para la Prevención, Tratamiento y Rehabilitación de las Víctimas de Tortura
(CPTRT). March 7, 2006. In this regard, see the report: Situación del Sistema Penitenciario en Honduras, drafted by
CPTRT
and
COFADEH,
presented
in
the
said
hearing
available
at:
http://www.cptrt.org/pdf/informesistemapenitenciarioCIDH.pdf.
344
IACHR, Report No. 14/11, P‐1347‐07, Admissibility, Orlando Olivares et al. (Deaths in the Vista
Hermosa Prison), Venezuela, March 23, 2011, paras. 1, 8, and 9.
345
I/A Court H.R., Case of Bulacio V. Argentina. Judgment of September 18, 2003. Series C No. 100,
para. 3.
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