In a split vote (6 in favor and 5 against), the full Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation ruled yesterday that the right to proper defense and due process of a person convicted for theft and homicide [committed May 2009] were violated; therefore, amparo [injunction] was granted on the grounds that the accused was assisted ''by someone trustworthy''--his father, who has only a secondary education--and not by an attorney, as was established by the 2008 constitutional reform* that implemented the adversarial trial system.
Voting against the amparo were Margarita Luna Ramos, Jorge Pardo Rebolledo, Alberto Gelacio Pérez Dayán, Luis María Aguilar and Fernando Franco, who even considered that in such a case, ''the gravity of the violation" committed against the defendant would not be sufficient to grant the requested amparo, since the ''only violation'' of procedure occurred during the defendant's confession that he participated in the robbery and murder that occurred in May 2009 in Apatzingán, Michoacán.
Disturbed by the decision, Justice Margarita Luna Ramos queried:
"This new culture and the new paradigm for the recognition of human rights. I ask you, don't the victims and society have human rights that must also be acknowledged, and to this extent to balance them and say that if someone is guilty, he must be punished? And not get off for a mere legalism?''She reminded her colleagues that in addition to this issue, whose effects of the decision will be determined at a future session, the full Court will hear--starting this Thursday--five other amparos in which they will review cases with sentences for murder, robbery , drug crimes and the case of a woman who was beheaded in her home in the presence of her minor children by a man who broke in to steal.
These are crimes, Luna Ramos emphasized, ''that greatly impact our society'' and now those convicted seek injunctions based on the 2008 reform, which established that the defendant must be assisted by a lawyer and not just by someone trusted [de confianza].
Deciding in favor of the amparo, Justice President John N. Silva Meza, José Ramón Cossío, Olga Sánchez Cordero, Sergio Valls, Arturo Zaldívar and Alfredo Gutiérrez Ortiz Mena, who noted that the proper defense is ensured by the possibility of freely choosing someone as defender who is a legal professional. In addition, after a reform is passed it can subsequently be applied for the benefit of the accused.
Justice Arturo Zaldívar added the Mexican government is obligated to safeguard that any person subject to legal process ''has the minimum conditions for ensuring a proper defense''.
Olga Sánchez Cordero stated:
Justice Arturo Zaldívar added the Mexican government is obligated to safeguard that any person subject to legal process ''has the minimum conditions for ensuring a proper defense''.
Olga Sánchez Cordero stated:
''we do not have to wait to see if the reform comes into effect immediately or not. The fundamental rights are already in place, and they are recognized by the Constitution itself.''
Spanish original
MV Note: In 2008 the Mexican Constitution was amended to change the criminal trial system from an inquisitorial one--in which prosecution and defense submit evidentiary documents to a judge who decides, in private, on the accused's guilt or innocence--to an adversarial system of public, oral trials in which the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty, and in which prosecution and defense present their arguments and witnesses testify. There are no juries. Judges continue to decide cases. By law the adversarial system is to be implemented by 2016; to date, however, it has been implemented in fewer than half the states. The issue before the Supreme Court is how to handle cases tried after passage of the legal reform, but before its implementation.
MV Note: In 2008 the Mexican Constitution was amended to change the criminal trial system from an inquisitorial one--in which prosecution and defense submit evidentiary documents to a judge who decides, in private, on the accused's guilt or innocence--to an adversarial system of public, oral trials in which the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty, and in which prosecution and defense present their arguments and witnesses testify. There are no juries. Judges continue to decide cases. By law the adversarial system is to be implemented by 2016; to date, however, it has been implemented in fewer than half the states. The issue before the Supreme Court is how to handle cases tried after passage of the legal reform, but before its implementation.