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Text File | 1994-06-01 | 25KB | 461 lines

<text> <title> Human Rights Watch World Report 1992: Argentina </title> <article> <hdr> Human Rights Watch World Report 1992 Americas Watch: Argentina </hdr> <body> Human Rights Developments Democracy in Argentina continued to be consolidated in 1991 as congressional and provincial elections were held in September and October, producing majorities for the ruling Justicialista (Peronist) Party of President Carlos Menem. Yet, violent human rights abuses remained entrenched in such institutions as the police and the prison service. To date, the government has not addressed these problems in a serious manner. On April 19, Walter Bulacio, a high school student, died while in custody of the police. His family charged that his death resulted from torture by the police. The police claim that he died of a pre-existing condition, but fail to explain how such a condition would lead to his death without other serious physical mistreatment. His death refocused public attention on the issue of police brutality and the arbitrary arrest of teenagers at night. Bulacio and approximately thirty other youths were detained outside a rock concert, under an Argentine law that permits the police to hold anyone for up to twenty-four hours for identification purposes. Police kicked and beat several of the prisoners, including Bulacio, who was hospitalized the next day and died a short time later. Groups of students protested his death in public demonstrations and called for a complete investigation. In response, the government sought repeal of police regulations known as "edicts," which permit the chief of police to impose periods of detention of up to thirty days without seeking judicial approval; an appeal may be made to the judiciary, but only in the twenty-four hours following notice of the police decision. The police edicts provide a legal cloak for detentions made without warrant or probable cause. In addition to the "edicts," the police dictate their own internal regulations in the form of "memoranda." In the case of minors arrested for identification purposes, the law stipulates that the police must immediately notify a judge and the minor's parents of the arrest. In practice, however, the police have been guided by Memorandum No. 40, which stipulates that they may hold minors for up to forty-eight hours without proper notification. In Congress a proposal was presented to reduce from twenty-four to ten the number of hours that the police could detain citizens without the intervention of a judge. The law was vetoed by President Menem, but Congress eventually overrode the veto. Because of the public outcry over the Bulacio case in particular and the detention of minors in general, the police were forced to scrap Memorandum No. 40. In addition to these legislative efforts, there has been a judicial challenge to the powers given to the police by the edicts. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court in October upheld their constitutionality. The September 1990 arrest and subsequent disappearance of Andrés Alberto Núñez has challenged the judiciary's will to investigate and punish abuses by the police. Witnesses affirm that Núñez was detained by the Investigative Brigade of La Plata, Buenos Aires, and that fellow prisoners heard his cries of pain inside the police precinct. While police originally denied that Núñez had been brought to the brigade, his name was discovered in the precinct's register. Nonetheless, the judge conducting the investigation has been less than energetic, and prosecuting lawyers doubt that the perpetrators will be held accountable for the crime. The government's response to such episodes has been at best inconsistent, and has lacked the forcefulness that the problems of torture and arbitrary arrest deserve. Vice President Eduardo Duhalde, elected governor of the province of Buenos Aires on September 8, reaffirmed after the election a so-called hard line toward criminals--a stance also adopted previously by other high-ranking officials, including President Menem himself. The hard line has included praise by Duhalde for Luis Alberto Patti, a police officer who has been credibly charged with torturing prisoners with an electric prod. It has even been rumored in the press that Duhalde may name Patti chief of police in the province of Buenos Aires. Patti was released from jail when he successfully petitioned for the removal of a judge who had managed to obtain a medical examiner's report that confirmed the use of electric shock on prisoners. Despite an appellate court's order to reopen the investigation, the new judge, Raúl Casal, has blocked further action. Meanwhile, with the help of Menem and Duhalde, Patti is enjoying his new image as a political celebrity. Patti's high standing with the government is all the more disappointing in light of his help in covering up the 1990 rape and murder of seventeen-year-old María Soledad Morales, in the northern province of Catamarca. All of the principal suspects were related to members of the province's political elite. Initial attempts at cover-up were thwarted by an impressive succession of popular demonstrations, organized by Soledad's teachers and schoolmates, which brought down the autocratic provincial government of Ramón Saadi. The sixth judge to investigate the case, José Luis Ventimiglia, who was assigned by the federal government, has virtually solved the crime, implicating the chief of police and perhaps the governor himself in the cover-up. Patti, assigned by President Menem as the special investigator, was eventually forced to resign after clashing with Ventimiglia and making statements to the press insisting that the prime suspect was the girl's boyfriend. The failure to investigate and punish police abuses was underscored by a study carried out by Alicia Pierini, the new human rights director in the Ministry of Interior. She diligently followed up on 678 reported cases of physical abuse of prisoners in police custody in the capital city of Buenos Aires between 1984 and 1986. Twenty-three of the thirty-three courts in the city responded to her request for information, and reported that 267 cases involved wounds confirmed by a medical examiner. Of these cases, ten were a result of electric shock. Despite the disturbingly high incidence of abuse, not a single police officer or other security agent had been convicted. The Pierini initiative reflects the concern over human rights violations shown by some sectors of the government--also including the Justice Ministry--but at the same time highlights the problem of official impunity. The penitentiary system has been a breeding ground for abuse. The July death of twelve of the forty inmates in Federal Jail Number 13 in Santa Rosa, La Pampa caused alarm and requests for further investigations by the human rights division. A prison uprising to protest mistreatment resulted in the outbreak of a fire and the subsequent loss of life. The two prisoners involved in the uprising who survived the tragedy were promptly transferred to a distant jail, fueling suspicion of misconduct by prison authorities. Because the judge handling the case was the same magistrate who should have intervened in the negotiations with prisoners before the uprising and reportedly did not do so, the Office of the General Prosecutor (Fiscalía de la Nación) has sent two federal prosecutors to La Pampa in an attempt to guarantee a thorough investigation. The prosecutors have pressed charges against the entire prison staff. Americas Watch recognizes and applauds the role of the government in this episode, and believes that similar action is warranted to combat torture in police precincts, as well as the arbitrary arrest of youths and the shooting of criminal suspects by the police. In Buenos Aires and its suburbs, the police frequently kill common-crime suspects, and routinely label such episodes "confrontations." However, further