On March 27, 1990, Ms. María Teresa De La Cruz Flores was detained, charged with terrorism and later prosecuted by a court composed of "faceless" judges and sentenced to twenty years imprisonment. On February 19, 2003, newly enacted Peruvian laws established that, within sixty working days from this legislation entering into force, the National Terrorism Chamber should gradually annul the judgment and the oral proceeding and declare the absence of grounds for the charge in criminal trials for offenses of terrorism conducted before secret judges or prosecutors. However, at the date the Commission submitted its application to the Court, Ms. De La Cruz Flores remained in detention. The Court found that the State violated the American Convention on Human Rights.
Case Summary: De La Cruz-Flores v. Peru, Case Summary