CCPR/C/112/D/2105/2011 of 30 June 2008. In view of the formal absence of a court of appeal to review criminal matters, the Supreme Court has itself determined, in its jurisprudence, 5 that it is competent to review all the evidence considered in the judgement subject to review in cassation, subject to the limitation that it was not the court before which subjective evidence was brought, since the assessment of such evidence depends, to a great extent, on the direct perception of the court before which it is brought. Thus, in the authors’ case, the Supreme Court held that it could not reassess the subjective evidence brought before the court of first instance, but that it had to, and indeed did, establish whether there was sufficient inculpatory evidence of the commission of the acts and the involvement of the defendants before the court of first instance; that fundamental rights and freedoms had been respected in obtaining the evidence; that the principles of orality, public access, immediacy and audi alteram partem had been upheld in the collection of evidence during oral proceedings; and that the conviction had been sufficiently substantiated. 6.3 The State party reiterates its observations regarding the authors’ allegations of a violation of article 14, paragraph 7, and points out that the criminal proceedings that resulted in the judgements in 2004 and the conviction of 30 June 2008 were not objectively identical, as they related to different facts. 6.4 The State party rejects the authors’ allegations of a violation of article 14, paragraph 1, on the grounds that the three criminal proceedings had not been merged into a single trial. This allegation was not included in the initial submission to the Committee and should therefore be declared inadmissible. In any case, there was, strictly speaking, no need to merge the proceedings, as they dealt with different facts. Authors’ comments on the State party’s submissions on the merits 7.1 On 11 June 2012, the authors submitted their comments on the State party’s submissions on the merits of the communication. The authors reiterated their allegations under article 14, paragraphs 5 and 7. The State party did not question the Committee’s jurisprudence according to which the remedy of amparo is ineffective in relation to the allegations of a violation of article 14, paragraph 5, nor did it comment on or question the Committee’s jurisprudence according to which it found that the Supreme Court’s review in cassation of the conviction did not constitute a review within the meaning of this provision of the Covenant. 7.2 To safeguard the principle of ne bis in idem contained in article 14, paragraph 7, the State party’s courts should have grouped together the criminal charges against the authors in order to examine all the closely related facts simultaneously, in a single trial. Issues and proceedings before the Committee Consideration of admissibility 8.1 Before considering any claim contained in a communication, the Human Rights Committee must, in accordance with rule 93 of its rules of procedure, decide whether or not the case is admissible under the Optional Protocol to the Covenant. 8.2 The Committee has ascertained that the same matter is not being examined under any other procedure of international investigation or settlement, as required by article 5, paragraph 2 (a), of the Covenant. 8.3 The Committee takes note of the State party’s arguments that the communication is inadmissible, under article 5, paragraph 2 (b), of the Optional Protocol, on the grounds of 5 GE.14-20560 The State party refers to Supreme Court judgement STS 249/2004 of 4 March, p. 31. 7