Información Inglés
A HISTORICAL JUDGMENT
Rear-admiral CJ* Carlos Enrique Mesa Angosto
President of Supreme Court of Military and Police Justice
*Judicial Body of the Peruvian Navy
In concordance with the Constitution and International Jurisprudence, the Constitutional Court (CC) declared unfounded the demand of unconstitutionality raised by the Lima Bar Association, against the Law No. 29182, Law on Organization and Functions of the Military and Police Jurisdiction.
I consider this judgment as historic due it makes justice to an institution that has been praised by all the Constitutions of the Republic as an autonomous and independent jurisdiction, whose aims are the administration of justice in the military and police stage and the preservation of order and discipline of our Armed Forces and National Police, which contributes to the national defense and national sovereignty.
The judgment absolutely invalidates the questions about the independence of the military judges, to be part of a hierarchy and be appointed by the Executive, and the existence of a Police Prosecutor of the Military and Police Jurisdiction.
On the first point, the Constitutional Court upheld the constitutionality of the status of official activity of the judges of military courts. For this, the Constitutional Court has based its judgment on the jurisprudence of the main international human rights protection. For example, it noted the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights (Morris versus Kingdom), which indicate that the practice of using composed courts in whole or in part by military in activity to judge to members of the Armed Forces, is deeply rooted in the legal systems of many Member States of the European Union, and a court of this kind can be an independent and impartial tribunal.
Thereon, the Constitutional Court has used the jurisprudence of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights, which in the Castillo Petruzzi v. Peru case, noted that judges of military courts can be designated military in activity by the Executive, just in case they judge crimes of a military order.
About the existence of an Attorney of the Military and Police Jurisdiction, the Constitutional Court has indicated that, according with the principle of the Constitution unity, the Constitution (articles 139 and 173) to recognize the existence of a military court, it also implies the existence of a own fiscal system, since the punishment of function crimes implies necessarily the persecutory stage (fiscal) and the trial stage (court).
Who are members of the legal military police community, we know that this judgment contributes to strengthen the National Defense System, since it provides the appropriate legal framework for the Armed Forces and National Police, doing their constitutional legal functions correctly, with full respect for human rights.
Our next challenge is work very hard about what going to be the design of the new Military Police Criminal Code, with the highest legal soundness ever, according whit the requirements of efficient law enforcement to service of a modern, democratic state which strengthening their institutions to preserve their sovereignty and achieving its development in a climate of peace, order and security for their citizens.
Published by the Newspaper "Expreso". January 10, 2010.
