60% of homicide prosecutions fail

PERPETRATORS of 60 percent of homicides in Panama walk free says First Senior Prosecutor Geomara Guerra de Jones.

 Among the factors is that the vast majority are related to gangs or organized crime with witnesses afraid to testify.
La Prensa quotes an example of a 23 year old working for a telecommunications ompany who was gunned at a gas station in Monte Oscuro, in the capital city, in sight of workers and other witnesses, none of whom were willing to testify.
Even the introduction of protected witnesses has had little effect on the number of convictions.
The lack of input from experts qualified to provide scientific evidence linking suspects to a crime is another cause of the lack of effectiveness in judicial proceedings.
A judge of the Second Court, requesting anonymity for security reasons, said that lack of equipment in the Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences (Imelfc) and the absence of qualified experts impede instruction summaries.
The judge said that between 75% and 80% of those processed in the Second Court cases are related to organized crime or are linked to gangs.
In many cases, especially if they are linked to organized crime, juries are intimidated. Relatives or friends of the accused appear in the courtroom, engendering fear in juries.
A source said that prosecutors are ften not able to collect enough evidence linking suspects to the crime
Imelfc director, Humberto Mas, acknowledged that the institution suffered major budget cuts hampering the work of criminology experts, forensic psychiatrists and psychologists responsible for the analysis of the evidence.
He said that in 2,015 the institute got $30 million, $23 million less than they actually need and there was an “exodus” of experts
According to the coroner, with the arrival of the penal accusatory system, scientific evidence will be crucial in the process of linkage and formulation of charges in homicide cases.

Carlos Herrera  Morán, member of the National Bar Association, said that impunity in murder cases is often due to the lack of preparation by prosecutors. Moran think that in cases SOME poor examination of applications and the lack of expertise of some staff is r favoring impunity.
So far this year there have been 158 homicides across the country, 48 less than those committed in the same period of 2014.
The figures show that 95% of the killings were with firearms and the rest with knives and other sharp objects.
According to prosecutors, the majority of the crimes were related to revenge, disputes and quarrels between rival drug gangs that control different territories.